Bitcoin miner IREN pivots to European AI with Nostrum acquisition

The deal integrates Nostrum’s existing development pipeline and a team of 50 specialists into IREN’s operations, establishing Spain as a primary hub for the company’s expansion. Co-founder Daniel Roberts highlighted Spain’s robust renewable energy access and fiber connectivity as key drivers for the investment, characterizing the region as a vital entry point for global AI demand.

Financial data underscores the urgency of this transition. In the quarter ending March 31, IREN reported a drop in mining revenue to $111.2 million, down from $167.4 million in the previous period, while AI cloud revenue nearly doubled to $33.6 million. The company, which recently posted a $247.8 million net loss due to hardware decommissioning and market shifts, is now leaning heavily into its five-year, $3.4 billion contract with NVIDIA and support for a $9.7 billion Microsoft cloud project in Texas.

IREN joins a growing cohort of miners, including HIVE Digital and Bitdeer, who are repurposing power-heavy mining sites across Europe and North America to host AI workloads. HIVE is currently retrofitting its Swedish facility to support 2,000 NVIDIA GPUs, while Bitdeer plans to transition its Norway-based Tydal-2 site to AI capacity by late 2026. This industry-wide migration suggests that market valuations for miners are increasingly tethered to their physical ability to deliver high-performance compute rather than pure Bitcoin production.