The Conversation (0)
Blackstone (NYSE: BX) announced today that private equity funds affiliated with Blackstone Capital Partners and Blackstone Energy Transition Partners (collectively "Blackstone") have entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Flow Control Holdings ("FCH"), a leading U.S. provider of highly engineered flow control solutions and components for the data center liquid cooling, food, beverage, and pharmaceutical markets, from Audax Private Equity ("Audax"). As part of the transaction, Audax will retain a minority equity stake in FCH, continuing to partner with Blackstone and management to support the company.
Headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio, FCH's highly engineered, high-performance components are used by original equipment manufacturers (OEM) and hyperscalers for coolant distribution units (CDUs), in-row manifolds and secondary fluid networks (SFN). Liquid cooling is significantly more energy efficient than air cooling, allowing data centers to reduce CO2 emissions, improve power usage effectiveness, and support next generation of compute.
Bilal Khan, Senior Managing Director, and Mark Zhu, Managing Director, at Blackstone, said: "We believe that FCH has enormous tailwinds for continued growth as the latest generations of high-performance AI infrastructure increasingly rely on liquid cooling technology for significantly improved energy and chip efficiency. FCH has built deep trust with their customers for some of the most demanding workloads across both the data center and food, beverage, and pharmaceutical markets. We look forward to partnering with Scott and the entire FCH management team, as well as Audax, to invest in the company's capacity expansion plan, support unprecedented liquid cooling demand, and further accelerate growth behind one of Blackstone's highest-conviction investment themes the immense buildout of AI infrastructure."
"We're thrilled to partner with Blackstone as we enter our next chapter of growth," added Scott Kerns, Chief Executive Officer of FCH. "Over the past four years, we've invested significantly to develop a leading position in the data center cooling market supporting our OEM customers and hyperscalers. Audax has been a tremendous partner supporting FCH through investments in the team, capital for new production and distribution facilities, and the execution of 10 acquisitions to build FCH's capabilities in the data center cooling, food, beverage and pharma markets."
"We believe the sale of FCH represents a tremendous outcome for the incredibly dedicated and talented team at FCH as well as our investors," added Audax Private Equity Partner Don Bramley. "Scott and the entire team have been outstanding partners in building FCH as a leader in the data center cooling market. We view the FCH investment as a text-book example of Audax's ability to build strategic assets through disciplined execution of the Audax Value Agenda TM and Buy & Build approach. We look forward to partnering with Blackstone and continuing to support FCH in its next chapter of growth."
Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. The transaction is expected to close in the fourth quarter. Houlihan Lokey and Jefferies served as financial advisors to FCH, while Ropes & Gray LLP served as legal counsel. William Blair, UBS, and Goldman Sachs served as financial advisors to Blackstone, while Kirkland & Ellis LLP served as legal counsel.
About Flow Control Holdings
Flow Control Holdings specializes in providing highly engineered sanitary and high-purity flow components for critical applications within the data center, food, beverage, and pharmaceutical industries. For more information, visit the FCH website, at www.fchinc.com .
About Blackstone
Blackstone is the world's largest alternative asset manager. Blackstone seeks to deliver compelling returns for institutional and individual investors by strengthening the companies in which the firm invests. Blackstone's over $1.3 trillion in assets under management include global investment strategies focused on real estate, private equity, credit, infrastructure, life sciences, growth equity, secondaries and hedge funds. Further information is available at www.blackstone.com . Follow @Blackstone on LinkedIn , X (Twitter) , and Instagram .
About Blackstone Energy Transition Partners
Blackstone Energy Transition Partners is Blackstone's strategy for control-oriented equity investments in energy-related businesses, with a successful long-term record, having committed approximately $30 billion of equity globally across a broad range of sectors across the energy transition landscape. Our investment philosophy is based on backing exceptional management teams with flexible capital to provide solutions that help energy companies grow and improve performance, thereby delivering more reliable, affordable and cleaner energy to meet the needs of the global community. In the process, we build stronger, larger scale enterprises, create jobs and generate lasting value for our investors, employees and all stakeholders. Further information is available at https://www.blackstone.com/our-businesses/blackstone-energy-transition-partners/ .
About Audax Private Equity
Headquartered in Boston, with offices in San Francisco, New York, London and Hong Kong, Audax Private Equity is a leading private equity platform focused on investing across the North American middle market. Our objective is to accelerate value creation through our Buy & Build strategy and the Audax Value Agenda™, a holistic framework that seeks to enable, create, and protect value across every stage of the investment lifecycle. As of July 2026, Audax Private Equity had approximately $20 billion of assets under management and, since inception in 1999, has invested in more than 180 platforms and more than 1,500 add-on acquisitions. For more information, visit www.audaxprivateequity.com or follow us on LinkedIn .
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260910210431/en/
Media
Blackstone
Matt Anderson
Matthew.Anderson@Blackstone.com
Jennifer Heath
Jennifer.Heath@Blackstone.com
Audax Private Equity
audaxprivateequity@gasthalter.com
