HIVE Digital Technologies announced on August 17, 2026, a five-year GPU cloud services deal worth approximately $350 million through its BUZZ HPC subsidiary, deploying 2,016 NVIDIA Blackwell Ultra GPUs. The agreement underscores the Bitcoin miner’s strategic pivot toward accelerated compute for AI workloads.
🔑 Key Takeaways
- Five-year $350M AI cloud deal signed with an investment-grade enterprise client via BUZZ HPC
- Deployment of 2,016 NVIDIA Blackwell Ultra GPUs (GB300 NVL72) at Merritt, British Columbia
- $70M in expected annualized revenue, bringing total BUZZ HPC ARR to ~$180M
- Q1 FY2027: $79.1M revenue (+73.5% YoY), 1,004 BTC mined (+147% YoY)
- Target maintained: $200M GPU cloud ARR by end of 2026
A $350M mega-deal for BUZZ HPC with 2,016 Blackwell Ultra GPUs
HIVE Digital Technologies confirmed on August 17, 2026, a five-year GPU cloud services agreement worth approximately $350 million with an investment-grade enterprise client. The deal, executed through BUZZ High Performance Computing (BUZZ HPC), a wholly-owned subsidiary, involves a dedicated AI infrastructure cluster of 2,016 NVIDIA Blackwell Ultra GPUs integrated into NVIDIA GB300 NVL72 rack-scale systems. The cluster will leverage NVIDIA Quantum-X800 InfiniBand networking and the VAST Data high-performance storage platform.
In practice, BUZZ HPC will operate the cluster for large-scale training, inference (real-time execution of pre-trained models), and other enterprise workloads. The infrastructure is expected to go live later this year at the Bell AI Fabric facility in Merritt, British Columbia, with NVIDIA hardware delivery and deployment scheduled for Q4. By that point, HIVE expects daily HPC and AI revenue to reach approximately $500,000 per day.
BUZZ HPC targets $200M GPU ARR by end of 2026
The new contract is expected to generate approximately $70 million in annualized revenue (ARR), bringing BUZZ HPC’s total annualized run-rate to roughly $180 million, split between $35 million of active and realized ARR and $145 million of contractual ARR expected by Q4 2026. CEO Aydin Kilic reaffirmed the company’s $200 million GPU cloud ARR target for year-end.
Several pillars round out the pipeline. An approximately $225 million three-year deal with Bell AI Fabric supports Cohere, and a letter of intent for colocation at the Big Boden facility in Sweden represents approximately $45 million in potential ARR. In total, HIVE’s HPC and AI ARR pipeline stands at roughly $155 million, with a 2028 target of $660 million in annualized HPC revenue.
« With approximately 400 MW of capacity in Canada for Tier III data center development, we have the potential to bring over 120,000 GPUs online over the next two years. »
Frank Holmes, Executive Chairman of HIVE
Q1 FY2027 results: revenue up 73.5%, Bitcoin remains the engine
First-quarter fiscal 2027 results, released the same day, confirm the strength of HIVE’s core crypto business. The company posted total revenue of $79.1 million, up 73.5% year-over-year and 10.2% sequentially. Digital currency revenue reached $72.1 million (+76.6% YoY), driven by record production.
| Metric | Q1 FY2027 | YoY Change |
|---|---|---|
| Total revenue | $79.1M | +73.5% |
| Digital currency revenue | $72.1M | +76.6% |
| BUZZ HPC revenue | $7.1M | +46.7% |
| Bitcoin mined | 1,004 BTC | +147% |
| Average operational hashrate | 24.0 EH/s | vs 8.7 EH/s |
| Gross operating margin | $24.2M (30.6%) | – |
| Adjusted EBITDA | $13.4M (17.0%) | – |
HIVE received 1,004 Bitcoin in rewards during the period (+147% YoY), as the average operational hashrate climbed from 8.7 EH/s to 24.0 EH/s in one year. BUZZ HPC revenue rose 46.7% YoY and 52.1% sequentially to $7.1 million, supported by the deployment of an NVIDIA B200 cluster in Manitoba. Gross operating margin reached 30.6% of revenue ($24.2M), while adjusted EBITDA totaled $13.4M (17.0%).
GAAP net results, however, showed a $142.9 million loss, primarily driven by non-cash charges: an $84.7 million provision for regulatory liabilities and $53.7 million in depreciation. As of June 30, 2026, HIVE held $208.0 million in cash and equivalents plus $11.2 million in digital currencies.
$185M capex and pivot to energy-efficient AI
The new cluster deployment represents approximately $185 million in capital expenditures (capex), including accelerated compute, associated hardware, and service warranties. The client will provide an upfront payment of approximately $35 million, equivalent to ~10% of the total contract value, which — combined with previously announced financing initiatives and additional equipment financing — is expected to support the deployment. HIVE will retain ownership of the NVIDIA infrastructure after deployment.
The Merritt facility is powered by renewable hydroelectric energy and uses closed-loop liquid cooling designed to eliminate water consumption for cooling. The site fits into a broader strategy: a planned 320 MW data center in the Greater Toronto Area, designed to host over 100,000 GPUs at full capacity, is expected to generate approximately $360M in ARR at full ramp. The same day, HIVE announced that the Boden municipal council in Sweden had approved its purchase of the 32 MW Big Boden facility. HIVE moves from tenant to owner after eight years of operations and over $100 million in cumulative Swedish krona investments.
The strategic pivot of Bitcoin miners: HIVE is not alone
The deal illustrates a deeper trend among Bitcoin miners: redirecting GPU capacity originally built for mining toward higher-margin AI workloads. HIVE began this pivot in 2022. Keel Infrastructure (formerly Bitfarms) followed the same path and sold its last mining facility in Paraguay in April. The bet: transform infrastructure originally designed for Bitcoin’s proof-of-work consensus into compute capacity for training and inference, where demand is exploding and entry barriers remain high against hyperscalers (AWS, Azure, GCP).
Conclusion: a credibility test for the hybrid model
For HIVE, this contract is more than a commercial announcement — it validates the transformation of a Bitcoin miner into a large-scale AI infrastructure provider. The strength of the profile — investment-grade client, five-year duration, 10% upfront payment, owned infrastructure — reassures on the economics of the deal, but the $185M capex and $200M GPU ARR target by end of 2026 remain ambitious commitments. The bull case sees HPC ARR surpassing $660M by 2028 across Merritt, Toronto, and Boden; the bear case assumes deployment delays and HPC margin dilution against hyperscaler competition. The market weighed in on Monday: HIVE shares rose nearly 10.5% in early trading.
Sources
- The Block — Bitcoin miner HIVE inks five-year $350 million AI cloud contract
- Yahoo Finance — HIVE stock surges on $350M NVIDIA AI cloud deal
- Biggo Finance — Coverage of HIVE’s 5-year GPU cloud agreement
- Proactive Investors — HIVE Digital Technologies inks five-year $350M GPU cloud agreement
- Finviz — HIVE signs $350 million AI cloud services agreement as BUZZ HPC expands contracted revenue
- KuCoin News — Bitcoin mining firm HIVE signs $350M AI cloud services contract
This article is published for informational and educational purposes only. It does not constitute investment advice. Do your own research (DYOR) before making any decision.
