Welcome back. I recently joined The Wall Street Journal’s softball team, and our first game of the season is tonight against NBC News. Having played baseball from kindergarten through high school, and still spending my weekends in a casual Central Park league, I'm ready to see if those skills translate to a corporate rivalry.

But while I’m switching to softball tonight, the markets are playing some serious hardball.

Today, Samantha Kroontje, WSJ Pro's newest bankruptcy reporter, and  Alicia McElhaney share news of Brookfield-backed software supplier CDK Global working with creditors to restructure its $5.5 billion of debt.

Meanwhile, Apollo, joined by Blackstone and a syndicate of banks, has established $35 billion in financing capacity for artificial-intelligence infrastructure development, Connor Hart reports for the Journal.

Finally, the Journal's Sam Goldfarb writes that tech companies are hungry for cash to invest in data centers, and investors are forking it over every way they can.

Now on to the news...

Apollo Global Management, joined by Blackstone and banks, has established $35 billion in financing for artificial-intelligence infrastructure using Broadcom chips and networking technology, Connor Hart reports for the Journal. Called the AI XPV Platform, the financing will enable the development of computing centers drawing as much as 20 gigawatts of power. The capacity is needed to support AI inference engines and models being developed by companies such as Anthropic and OpenAI, though the initial $35 billion will be dedicated to Anthropic's needs.

Brookfield-backed software company CDK Global is in talks with creditors to restructure its $5.5 billion of debt, WSJ Pro reports, citing people with knowledge of the matter. The supplier of software designed for auto dealerships and original equipment manufacturers has been in discussions with a group of creditors led by Pimco and Blackstone, the people said. CDK is grappling with debt raised in its leveraged buyout by Brookfield in 2022. But the company also faced a cash crunch after it paid tens of millions of dollars in ransom to restore its systems after a massive cyberattack in 2024.

Investment rounds and IPOs raising 11-figure sums. Blockbuster bond sales spanning three continents. The casual announcement of an $85 billion equity raise. Such is life on Wall Street at the dawn of the artificial-intelligence build-out, Sam Goldfarb writes for the Journal. Tech companies are hungry for cash to invest in data centers, and investors are forking it over through all possible means, in all parts of the globe—a flurry of fundraising that has mostly supported markets by powering technological advances, even as it tests their ability to absorb it all.

Gemspring Capital Management has made a minority investment in Comoto Holdings, a Philadelphia-based retail platform focused on motorcycle and powersports. Existing backer Prospect Hill Growth Partners will retain a majority stake. Prospect Hill invested in the company back in 2016, when the private-equity firm was still branded as J.W. Childs & Associates.

Buyout firm TPG is backing tax and wealth advisory services provider Smith + Howard, investing through its TPG Growth strategy. The Atlanta-based company with about 800 professionals has been backed since 2022 by Broad Sky Partners.

Specialist investor Archimed has acquired radiopharmaceuticals developer Institut de Radiofarmàcia Aplicada de Barcelona, whose products are designed for use in diagnostic procedures with Positron Emission Tomography, or PET, technology. PET scans are used in oncology, neurology and cardiology.

Abry Partners in Boston is making a strategic investment in computer and related enterprise services provider KaufmanIT. The Irvine, Calif.-based company has as many as 2,500 users in Southern California.

Chariot Capital Group, a Los Angeles-based firm that specializes in corporate carve-outs, divestitures and complex deals, has acquired Laser Clinics UK from Laser Clinics Group, which is backed by private-markets giant KKR.

Bain Capital in Boston has joined the prospective bidders interested in taking private Sydney-listed outdoor advertising and communications company oOh!media, and has submitted a conditional and nonbinding indicative offer, according to a regulatory filing Tuesday. Pacific Equity Partners and I Squared Capital are in discussions with the company as well and there may be interest from other would-be bidders, according to the filing. The company's shares rose about 9.6% Tuesday in Sydney.

General Atlantic in New York led a €450 million, or roughly $519.1 million, growth investment in satellite intelligence provider Iceye in a deal that valued the Finnish business at over €10 billion, Najat Kantouar reports for Dow Jones Newswires. Other investors joined the transaction including the Qatar Investment Authority and technology-focused TCV. In addition, a secondary placement brought the value of the deal to more than €1 billion.

Platte River Equity is backing Tallman Equipment Company, which supplies tools, equipment, services and support for the electric utility and linework industries. The deal marks the Denver-based private-equity firm’s 100th acquisition since it was founded in 2006.

Growth-equity investor VMG Partners led an investment in protein bar maker Stars + Honey to finance its expansion. The Michigan startup, founded in 2023, is nearing about $50 million in 2026 revenue and aims to construct a new manufacturing plant.

Private-credit firm Raven Capital has arranged a $655 million refinancing for online credit provider Elevate, extending the firm's long relationship with the company. Hudson Cove Capital Management also participated in the refinancing. The deal is expected to fuel Elevate's expansion in asset-based lending.

Viking Global Investors led a $100 million growth investment in device maker GT Medical Technologies, joined by existing backers such as MVM Partners and Evidity Health Capital. The company makes devices used in treating operable brain tumors.

Midmarket investor H.I.G. Capital's credit arm, H.I.G. WhiteHorse, is backing a corporate carve-out of protective films and tapes supplier Chargeurs Films de Protection by KPS Capital Partners.

Architect Equity has acquired Material Handling Exchange, a North American provider of new and used material handling equipment.

River Pines Capital has invested in Bendon, a producer of licensed children's coloring, activity and educational products. Bendon's founder and chief executive, Ben Ferguson, will continue to lead the company, and he and members of his management team will retain a meaningful ownership stake in the company.

Five Arrows, the alternative-investment arm of Rothschild & Co., has taken a majority stake in animal health supplement distributor Vetz Petz, according to an emailed statement. Vetz Petz’s founders will retain a significant minority stake in the company, which distributes Antinol, a nutraceutical used to support joint and mobility care in dogs and cats.

Warburg Pincus in New York has invested $225 million in OceanFirst Financial, the Nasdaq-listed parent company of $23 billion regional services provider OceanFirst Bank, investing after its $579 million combination with Flushing Financial and its New York-focused Flushing Bank. The combination created a Red Bank, N.J.-based company with 71 branches from Virginia to Massachusetts. Warburg's investment gives it a roughly 9.9% common equity stake in the bank, a regulatory filing shows.

Our add-on deal interactive tool allows you to sort and analyze volumes of add-on deal data compiled by WSJ Pro. View more.

Thrive Capital and Khosla Ventures are among OpenAI's early backers and are expected to reap a windfall from the artificial-intelligence technology developer's initial public offering later this year, the Journal reports. The maker of ChatGPT said Monday that it had confidentially filed IPO paperwork with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Consumer-focused firm Encore Consumer Capital has sold nearly all of its equity in dry blend ingredients manufacturer Twang Foodservice to the U.S. division of European food ingredient company Solina. Encore initially backed Twang, whose legal name is TP Parent, in 2023. The private-equity firm, co-investors and the company’s founding Treviño family retained their stake in Twang’s branded packaged foods business.

Arlington Capital Partners is selling surgical supplies producer Riverpoint Medical to strategic buyer Novanta for as much as $1.45 billion, including $1.2 billion up front, representing roughly 17 to 19 times the company's estimated adjusted pre-tax earnings for this year. Arlington acquired Portland, Ore.-based Riverpoint in 2019, according to the firm's website.

Houston-based Post Oak Energy Capital said that portfolio company Midway Energy Partners has sold Permian Basin assets to multiple oil and gas operators.

Midmarket firm Sentinel Capital Partners has sold electrical products manufacturer NSI Industries to strategic buyer Hubbell for $3 billion, the Journal reports. Sentinel initially acquired Huntersville, N.C.-based NSI in 2024 and last year sold the company’s HVAC division to Lennox International for $550 million.

Lower midmarket firm LongWater has raised a total of $262.5 million for its debut fund structured as a Small Business Investment Company. The fund’s final tally includes leverage provided through the Small Business Administration. The fund focuses on direct private-credit and noncontrolling equity investments in small U.S. businesses.

Royal Bank of Canada's RBC Global Asset Management U.S. arm has set up a new private-credit interval fund targeting individual investors who are interested in backing collateralized loan obligations. The closed-end vehicle, RBC BlueBay Enhanced Income Fund, invests in junior debt portions of CLOs and can invest in other structured credit securities. The fund requires a minimum commitment of at least $2,500 for two of its three classes of shares, and $100,000 for the third.

Venture secondary firm G Squared Capital has raised at least $1.25 billion so far for G Squared VII, according to a regulatory filing. The new fund’s tally so far puts it above the $1.1 billion that the firm raised for its previous fund back in 2024.

Barings is expanding its leadership ranks with the addition of Brad Finkle as global chief operating officer, a new role, while Eric Lloyd is moving up to vice chairman from president and Bryan High, head of global finance, is joining the senior leadership team of the Charlotte, N.C.-based unit of Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Co. Finkle was most recently with TIAA. Barings managed about $481 billion at the end of March.

Sixth Street Partners has added Jenny Kim as a managing director based in Singapore, where she will focus on capital formation and strategy in the Asia-Pacific market, except Japan, for the U.S. firm, according to an emailed statement. She joins from Goldman Sachs, where she was a managing director based in Singapore, according to her LinkedIn page.

Multistrategy asset manager Ridgepost Capital in Dallas has named Brian McKenna as vice president, investor relations, starting June 15. He joins from Citizens Financial Group, where he worked as an equity research analyst.

Houston-based CAZ Investments has named Greg Grissom as executive director of sports investing, a newly created role at the firm. Grissom previously served as president of the Houston Texans franchise of the National Football League.

Elon Musk's SpaceX is among the most widely held investments across colleges and universities, endowment executives say, likely making the rocket company’s coming IPO one of the great windfalls for American endowments, Juliet Chung reports for the Journal. Many schools’ investments in SpaceX make up a low-single-digits percentage of their endowments, though some are at 10% or more. Gains from the anticipated initial public offering later this month at a roughly $1.77 trillion valuation could generate paper gains in the billions for some endowments.

Life insurers accelerated purchases of private credit last year with carriers owned by private-equity firms leading the charge, Matt Wirz reports for the Journal, citing a Moody’s Ratings analysis. Overall, U.S. life insurers held $807 billion of private credit and illiquid assets in 2025, comprising 20% of their $4 trillion in fixed-income assets. That compares with $685 billion, or 18%, held the year before, according to Moody’s. KKR & Co.’s insurance unit Global Atlantic and Apollo Global Management’s Athene both increased their holdings by around 30%, Moody’s said.

Blackstone is looking to sell some $2 billion of stakes in private funds through a collateralized fund obligation, the Financial Times reports. CFOs allow firms to generate liquidity by issuing various tranches of bonds that are securitized by an underlying portfolio of funds.

Private-equity buyouts across the technology sector worldwide totaled $20 billion during this year's first quarter, down about 70% from the $65 billion recorded in the preceding quarter, according to industry consulting firm Bain & Co., which cited the disruptive influence of artificial-intelligence advances. Through the end of March, valuations of software companies held by private-equity firms declined roughly 8% on average, Bain said, citing data from MSCI. The decline was less pronounced in Europe, where software marks fell just 4.2% compared with 8.9% in the U.S.

The boom in artificial-intelligence businesses is fueling a revival in office-property markets in New York and San Francisco, the Journal reports. The hot Manhattan market is on pace this year for its best office-leasing performance since 2000, with AI companies' share of tech-sector deals in Manhattan jumping to 56% in this year's first quarter, more than double AI’s share during all of 2024, according to real-estate services firm Cushman & Wakefield. In San Francisco, AI businesses accounted for 58% of leasing activity in the first quarter.

Credit-focused Canyon Partners in Dallas is establishing an asset-backed finance strategy with enough balance sheet capital to supply over $5 billion in origination capacity. In addition to the firm's managers, Daiichi Life Insurance Co. and Korea Investment Holdings are supplying anchor investments to back Canyon ABF Partners. The firm is bringing in Jay Kim, who previously led Apollo Global Management affiliate Atlas SP Partners, to run the new strategy.

Credit specialist D2 Asset Management has securitized $358.5 million of home-equity loans originated and managed by partner company Unlock Technologies in Tempe, Ariz. The rated security, Unlock HEA Trust 2026-1, includes investment grade and noninvestment grade issues.

The Comvest Credit Partners arm of insurer Manulife Financial has closed a $428 million private-credit collateralized loan obligation, Comvest Credit 2026-1 CLO. The underlying notes are rated AAA through A by Standard & Poor's, according to Comvest.

Janus Henderson has agreed to acquire European private-markets firm Rantum Capital, strengthening the asset manager’s presence in Germany. Rantum offers debt and equity financing to small and midsize companies in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

Brookfield Asset Management and Mitsubishi HC Capital have formed a joint venture to acquire and operate a renewable energy company, with seed assets totaling about 570 megawatts of installed capacity across the U.K., Spain, Sweden, Finland, France and Ireland. The venture has an equity value of about €400 million, or around $461.7 million. New York-based Brookfield is in charge of the venture's operations, which are expected to commence by the end of June, while Mitsubishi brings financial and investment expertise to the table.

Clearlake Capital Group in Santa Monica, Calif., has acquired Pathway Capital Management, expanding the firm's assets under management to more than $185 billion.

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