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The Defense Department's ambitions to build hypersonic missiles has boosted the valuations of startups working in the field, Heather Somerville reports for the Journal.

SoftBank's Masayoshi Son is negotiating a plan with the Trump administration to invest hundreds of billions of dollars to help the U.S. build its AI infrastructure, the Journal also reports.

Finally, over the weekend private-equity pioneer Thomas O. Hicks died at age 79. He leaves behind a long legacy of both dealmaking and philanthropy. 

Now onto the news...

Private investment is pouring in as the Defense Department belatedly looks to close a hypersonic weapons gap, and startups—many of which haven’t built such systems at scale and haven’t flown anything at hypersonic speeds—are seeing their valuations soar, Heather Somerville reports for The Wall Street Journal. The latest is Torrance, Calif.-based Castelion. Investors led by Altimeter Capital and Lightspeed Venture Partners have just pumped in $350 million at a $2.8 billion valuation to help pay for a New Mexico factory to produce thousands of the weapons by late 2027.

SoftBank Group leader Masayoshi Son has big dreams of working closely with the Trump administration to revitalize U.S. manufacturing—and the promise of billions in Japanese cash to help pay for it, the Journal reports. After months of discussions with U.S. officials, Son is hammering out details of a plan that could see him marshaling hundreds of billions of dollars to build Trump-branded industrial parks on federal land to produce components for artificial-intelligence infrastructure. In South Korea on Friday, Son reiterated his belief that some day artificial superintelligence will far surpass human smarts, Dow Jones Newswires reported.

Thomas O. Hicks, veteran private-equity dealmaker, professional sports team owner and co-founder of multiple private-equity firms, died on Saturday at age 79. In 1989, the private-equity pioneer co-founded what became one of the larger firms of its era, Hicks Muse Tate & Furst, which raised more than $12 billion across six funds. Hicks resigned from Hicks Muse in 2004 to focus on his own family office, Dallas-based Hicks Holdings, which also has a small- and mid-market-focused private-equity arm called Hicks Equity Partners. He was an avid sports fan and at various points in his lifetime owned stakes in National Hockey League team the Dallas Stars, Major League Baseball team the Texas Rangers and English professional soccer team Liverpool FC. He also served as a presidentially appointed commissioner on the American Battle Monuments Commission during the first Trump administration. Hicks is survived by his wife, Cinda Cree Hicks, his six children and 14 grandchildren. "Of everything he accomplished in his remarkable life, Tom Hicks's most cherished title was, 'Dad,'" his children said in a joint statement. "No matter the trials and tribulations he faced in life, he was constant in his generosity and love for his family.”

Brookfield Asset Management and Singaporean sovereign-wealth fund GIC agreed to buy National Storage REIT NSR in a deal valuing the Australian self-storage operator at almost US$4.5 billion, Stuart Condie writes for The Wall Street Journal. The consortium entered into a takeover agreement for the largest self-storage provider in Australia and New Zealand after almost two weeks of exclusive due diligence.

Bain Capital has acquired insurance broker Jensten Group in the U.K. from Livingbridge, an investment group that had backed the business since 2018 and pursued a buy and build strategy with the company. Bain's acquisition closed following receipt of approval from Britain's Financial Conduct Authority, according to a LinkedIn post by Robert Organ, the broker's group chief executive.

General Catalyst led a €150 million, or roughly $174.7 million, growth investment in satellite radar provider Iceye, joined by a large group of mostly European investors such as Bpifrance. The deal valued the Helsinki-area company at €2.4 billion. Iceye operates a network of earth observation satellites that use synthetic aperture radar.

A blank-check company formed by healthcare-focused Perceptive Advisors in New York has agreed to combine with early-stage cancer-detection company Freenome Holdings and become a Nasdaq-listed public company. The transaction includes a $240 million public investment in private equity at $10 a share led by Perceptive and RA Capital Management with other participants including Bain Capital and Farallon Capital Management. The New York firm's Perceptive Capital Solutions raised about $86.2 million in an initial public offering in June 2024 and its Freenome deal would give the Brisbane, Calif., company an enterprise value of about $1.1 billion, according to research provider Boardroom Alpha.

Shares of infrastructure-focused asset manager DigitalBridge Group surged Friday on speculation that SoftBank Group is preparing a bid to acquire the Boca Raton, Fla., firm. The shares soared over 45% in New York Stock Exchange trading Friday to close at $14.12 following a Bloomberg News report that the two private-equity investors were in takeover talks, citing people with knowledge of the matter. JPMorgan Chase analyst Richard Choe reportedly figured a deal would be compelling at $28 a share, while other analysts suggested a range of $25 to $35. On Thursday, before the report, DigitalBridge shares closed at $9.72, giving it a market capitalization of about $1.83 billion.

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

Lone Star Funds is selling industrial pumps and valve manufacturer SPX Flow to strategic acquirer ITT for nearly $4.8 billion in cash and stock, Colin Kellaher reports for WSJ Pro. Lone Star in Dallas took the company private through a deal valued at $3.8 billion in 2022, investing through its 11th flagship fund.

OpenGate Capital-backed Sargent and Greenleaf has sold its high-security locking operations to strategic buyer Assa Abloy. OpenGate acquired S&G from Stanley Black & Decker in May 2019. Assa Abloy said it is buying S&G including its Nicholasville, Ky., main office and factory. The operations generated sales of about $45 million last year, according to the buyer.

Blue Owl Digital Infrastructure Trust, a real-estate investment trust, has amassed $1.7 billion so far, according to a regulatory filing. The trust has also completed the acquisition of 11 data centers across seven U.S. markets, the filing indicates.

GoldenTree Asset Management has completed a collateralized loan obligation with $753 million, GoldenTree Loan Management US CLO 27. The CLO has a five-year reinvestment period, a two-year noncall period and is managed by GoldenTree affiliate GLM III.

Sports specialist Arctos Partners and Todd Boehly's Eldridge Industries have agreed to manage a new 40 Act fund being raised by registered investment adviser CAIS Advisors to invest in sports, media and entertainment businesses. CAIS expects the vehicle to hold investments in major league sports teams in North America as well as music, video and live events properties. Accredited investors can participate in the vehicle, CAIS Sports, Media and Entertainment Fund, for a minimum investment of $25,000.

An analysis of top executive compensation showed private asset managers far surpass big Wall Street banks, Andy Serwer reports for sister publication Barron's. A study by pay consultant Equilar for Barron's determined that the average named executive officer of eight large publicly traded U.S. private-markets firms have received $2.3 billion in cumulative compensation since 2006, plus the value of their share sales since 2003 and current stock holdings. That compares with $331 million received by bankers of similar rank.

Bank regulators in Washington have rolled back risk limits that are widely credited with opening the door to nonbank lenders since the financial crisis that ended in 2009, the Journal reports. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency said Friday that those leveraged lending measures were "overly restrictive." Banks now will have more discretion to determine what kind of lending is safe, which will likely steepen competition with firms such as Ares Management and Apollo Global Management.

Next year, U.K. watchdogs may finally catch up with booming private markets as there are two regulatory probes into the sector in the works, Justin Cash reports for sister publication Financial News in London. A landmark review into private-market valuations by Britain's Financial Conduct Authority in March found "many examples of good practice" but also "areas where firms should make improvements." Most recently, the Bank of England unveiled a model for private-markets stress tests to be carried out starting in 2026.

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