This article was displayed on the ChosunBiz MoneyMove (MM) site at 2:17 p.m. on Jul. 24, 2026.
Global private equity fund (PEF) manager Blackstone is seeking to acquire facilities management (FM) company S&I Corporation. Given that S&I Corporation is a leading player in Korea's data center market, the move is seen as a vote of confidence in its growth potential.
According to the investment banking (IB) industry on the 24th, Blackstone took part in the preliminary bid for the sale of S&I Corporation held recently.
Blackstone previously acquired control of U.S. facilities management company GCA in 2012. In 2020, it acquired Thermo Holdings, a provider of mechanical and electrical systems and energy-efficiency services, and later built it up into Legend by adding several companies.
In addition to Blackstone, U.S. private equity firm Warburg Pincus has reportedly formed a consortium with a Korean strategic investor (SI) to join the bidding war. As Warburg Pincus has limited experience conducting a standalone buyout in Korea, it is seen as opting to partner with an SI.
Separately, a mid-sized Korean private equity fund has also set its sights on S&I Corporation. The potential buyers are now in full swing with due diligence ahead of the main bid.
S&I Corporation was established through a physical split of the FM business unit of D&O, formerly an LG Group affiliate. In Oct. 2021, D&O physically split off the FM business unit to create a new entity, S&I Expert, and in Feb. the following year sold a 60% equity stake in that entity to Macquarie Asset Management for 360 billion won. S&I Expert later changed its name to S&I Corporation. The remaining 40% equity is still held by LG Group.
The sale target is the 60% controlling equity stake held by Macquarie. The sale is being led by JPMorgan.
S&I Corporation has steadily improved its performance over the past few years. Revenue rose from 201 billion won in 2021 to 880.9 billion won last year. Over the same period, operating profit increased from 10.5 billion won to 49.6 billion won.
Data center operations and management is cited as S&I Corporation's main growth engine. While S&I Corporation does not directly develop or own data centers, it specializes in integrated management of core systems such as power, cooling, fire safety, and security. It currently manages about 20 sites, including the LG CNS Busan Cloud Data Center, the Microsoft Busan Data Center, and the Kakao Ansan Data Center. Last year, it also won the operations and management contract for the Gasan Data Center, developed by DCI Data Centers and Daelim. By number of facilities, it ranks No. 1 in Korea.
With the expansion of the artificial intelligence (AI) industry rapidly increasing power use and server density at data centers, growth prospects are also seen as strong for management providers. Graphics processing units (GPUs) used for AI computation consume more power and generate more heat than general servers, so the ability to operate cooling and power supply systems stably determines a data center's competitiveness.
The sell-side is said to be expecting an overall enterprise value for S&I Corporation of around 900 billion won. Considering that last year's earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) was in the low 60 billion won range, that implies a multiple of 15 times. The sale price for Macquarie's equity stake is estimated to come in around 600 billion won.