DigitalBridge Nabs Newmark Exec And Battery Unicorn Founder

DigitalBridge, fresh off its acquisition by SoftBank, is moving to pick up market share in the increasingly crowded data center sector, hiring a former Newmark capital markets executive and the founder of a grid-scale battery company.

Brent Mayo is joining DigitalBridge from Newmark as managing director for data center investment management and will focus on identifying and managing global investment opportunities, the Boca Raton, Florida-based alternative asset manager announced Monday.

Mayo joined Newmark from DH Capital in August 2023 to launch its data center and digital infrastructure practice group and is at least the third data center executive to exit in the last year.

His move follows the July departure of two other data center dealmakers at Newmark. Sumner Putnam, a site selection and colocation specialist, and Michael Morris, a consultant who had been at the firm for more than two decades, both left Newmark for Cresa in July.

“The demand for data center capacity has never been greater, and I look forward to leveraging my market experience and relationships to help identify and execute on attractive investment opportunities for DigitalBridge’s investors,” Mayo said in a statement. 

DigitalBridge, which had roughly $108B in assets under management at the end of the year, also announced Monday it had hired Nicholas Beatty as an operating partner for energy transition. Beatty founded London-based battery storage firm Zenobē Energy in 2017 and grew the company to unicorn status by 2023 with the backing of private equity firms like KKR before retiring from the company in October 2024.

“I have long admired DigitalBridge’s vision for the digital infrastructure ecosystem, and I look forward to supporting the firm’s energy transition strategy,” Beatty said. “The intersection of renewable energy, battery storage, and digital infrastructure represents one of the most exciting opportunities in global infrastructure today.”

SoftBank agreed to acquire DigitalBridge in December in an all-cash deal worth roughly $4B that took the asset manager off the public market. At the time, DigitalBridge's share price gave it an implied market value under $3B. The deal came months after earlier rumors that alternative asset manager 26North was looking to buy DigitalBridge. 

The company didn’t post first-quarter earnings as a result of the acquisition, but in December, it reported 14% fee revenue growth for 2025 and an 84% year-over-year increase in distributable earnings.

SoftBank has poured tens of billions of dollars into U.S. infrastructure to build out the data centers and energy plants needed to power the mass adoption of artificial intelligence tools.

“We continue to see demand for data center capacity and reliable power accelerate driven by strong technology adoption and sector fundamentals,” DigitalBridge Senior Managing Director Jon Mauck said. “Having leaders of Brent’s and Nicholas’s caliber at DigitalBridge positions our team to capitalize on compelling opportunities.”