US mining company acquires second customer with AI cloud service ── Contract for about 65 billion yen in 3 years | CoinDesk JAPAN | Coin Desk Japan

Cryptocurrency mining firm Applied Digital has announced that it has won a second customer for its AI (artificial intelligence) cloud service launched through its subsidiary. The amount could reach up to $460 million (approximately 64.4 billion yen, at an exchange rate of 140 yen to the dollar) over 36 months, he said in a press release on the 23rd. Shares of the company rose 17% after the announcement.

Applied Digital, like other crypto miners, has been looking for new revenue streams amid the sluggish crypto market. And the biggest potential is AI cloud computing, which has recently seen a surge of interest and demand.

In May of this year, it announced the acquisition of its first AI customer, worth up to $180 million over the next two years. Applied Digital is also partnering with hardware maker Supermicro to offer an AI cloud.

Mining operators have access to cheap electricity and already have data centers as infrastructure. But those options require companies to build customer-facing capabilities, compete with incumbents such as AWS, and often improve the quality of their data centers.

Competitor Iris Energy also recently announced it was reviving its strategy to attract customers seeking high-performance computing.

｜Translation: coindesk JAPAN
｜Editing: Takayuki Masuda
｜Image: Mining equipment (CoinDesk) awaiting shipment
｜Original: APLD Signs Artificial Intelligence Hosting Deal Worth Up to $460M