A DigitalBridge-managed investment vehicle has agreed to acquire PLUS ES, the smart metering arm of Australia’s Ausgrid Group, the companies announced on August 27, 2026. The deal, whose value was not disclosed, hands the US-based digital infrastructure investor a business that manages roughly 2 million electricity meters across Australia’s National Electricity Market (NEM). The transaction is subject to customary closing conditions, including regulatory approvals, and comes as Australia races toward a 2030 deadline for universal smart meter coverage.
Deal Structure Separates Regulated And Unregulated Metering Assets
PLUS ES operates as a ring-fenced, unregulated entity within Ausgrid Group, the NSW electricity distributor jointly owned by IFM Investors, APG Asset Management, AustralianSuper and the New South Wales Government. According to Ausgrid’s own announcement, only PLUS ES’s unregulated digital metering business is included in the sale. Its contestable infrastructure operations will move to other Ausgrid Group partnerships rather than transfer to DigitalBridge.
Ausgrid built PLUS ES around the 2017 acquisition of Active Stream, a metering provider it purchased from AGL Energy. Since then the unit has grown into one of the country’s largest accredited meter providers, connecting retailers, distributors and network operators with consumption and grid data.
DigitalBridge Frames The Deal Around Energy Transition Infrastructure
DigitalBridge describes itself as a global alternative asset manager focused on digital infrastructure, with three decades of experience across data centers, fiber, cell towers and edge computing. The firm is extending that thesis into metering, arguing that smart meters are foundational data infrastructure for grid modernization rather than a purely regulated utility asset class.
“PLUS ES sits at a compelling intersection of digital infrastructure and the energy transition,” said Justin Chang, Head of Asia Pacific and Senior Managing Director at DigitalBridge, in the company’s August 27, 2026 press release announcing the transaction.
Chang added in the same release that the roughly 2 million meters already deployed give PLUS ES meaningful scale, and that Australia’s rollout provides a long runway for growth backed by contracted deployment visibility.
Australia’s 2030 Smart Meter Mandate Is Reshaping Deal Timing
The acquisition lands directly on top of regulatory tailwinds. The Australian Energy Market Commission finalized a rule in November 2024 requiring universal smart meter deployment across the NEM by 2030, with accelerated rollout beginning in December 2025. AEMC Chair Anna Collyer has framed the reform as digital infrastructure essential to integrating rooftop solar, batteries and electric vehicles into the grid.
As of the AEMC’s most recent figures, more than 56 percent of NEM meters were already read remotely, with Victoria’s separate state-led program at 99 percent. NSW, Queensland, South Australia and the ACT still have substantial legacy meter bases to convert before the 2030 deadline, which is the market PLUS ES primarily serves.
Trade press coverage from Energy Magazine reported that the sale process for PLUS ES was reportedly sanctioned around December 2025, the same month the accelerated rollout formally commenced, as the accelerated mandate increased the strategic value of scaled metering providers with existing deployment pipelines.
Vendor Partnerships Underpin PLUS ES’s Technology Stack
PLUS ES has recently expanded its hardware and data-platform relationships ahead of the accelerated rollout. In September 2025, Landis+Gyr announced what it called its most comprehensive Grid Edge Intelligence contract in Australia to date with PLUS ES, covering wireless-enabled grid-edge meters and associated software and app services.
PLUS ES also expanded a decade-long partnership with metering technology supplier EDMI, extending use of EDMI’s hardware for six years and its Storm cloud intelligence platform for fifteen years, according to company materials. These agreements point to a multi-vendor hardware and analytics stack rather than a single-supplier deployment model, a structure common among large-scale Australian metering coordinators.
Competitive Landscape Includes Intellihub And Utility-Owned Rivals
PLUS ES competes chiefly with Intellihub, Australia’s other large-scale independent metering coordinator, along with smaller players such as Bluecurrent and Yurika. Intellihub has separately moved to upsize financing backed by shareholders Brookfield and Pacific Equity Partners to accelerate its own meter deployment ahead of the 2030 deadline, according to Energy Magazine’s reporting.
That competitive dynamic underscores why scaled, financially backed metering platforms are attracting private capital: networks and retailers need contracted deployment capacity fast enough to meet a fixed regulatory deadline covering millions of remaining legacy meters.
DigitalBridge’s Own Ownership Is Also In Transition
The PLUS ES deal comes as DigitalBridge itself is being acquired. SoftBank Group agreed in December 2025 to buy DigitalBridge for $16.00 per share in cash, an enterprise value of roughly $4 billion, in a deal tied to SoftBank’s broader push into AI-related data center and connectivity infrastructure. DigitalBridge stockholders approved that transaction in April 2026, and it is expected to close in the second half of 2026 pending regulatory approvals.
DigitalBridge has continued to execute infrastructure deals in parallel with the pending SoftBank transaction, including the PLUS ES agreement and other recent moves such as its stake sale in UK fiber operator Netomnia.
