Atlas Mining, based in Singapore and formerly operating large Bitcoin mining operations in China, is poised to relocate a significant portion of its hash rate to North America.
Atlas Mining said Tuesday that it has entered into a collaboration with Compute North, a mining colocation provider headquartered in the United States, to offer over 100 megawatts (MW) of hosting capacity. Atlas Mining’s equipment will begin deployment in Q1 of next year, the companies stated in the release, with a hash rate of about 3.7 exahashes per second (EH/s) at full deployment.
The agreement with Compute North comes just weeks after Atlas Mining announced another hosting arrangement with Core Scientific of the United States for more than 100 megawatts of capacity to be installed over the next 15 months.
The movements are part of Atlas’ worldwide relocation and growth strategy after China’s summer shutdown of Bitcoin mining activities. Additionally, the business is concentrating its efforts on additional high-profile locations, including northern Europe and Central Asia.
Atlas Mining is the Bitcoin mining division of Shanghai-based crypto and blockchain investment firm Fundamental Labs, which established a $44 million Bitcoin mining fund in 2019 to invest in tens of thousands of new pieces of equipment. Prior to the country’s June crackdown on space, the company’s activities were mostly concentrated on major Chinese mining centers.
Atlas Mining said today that it has purchased more than 200,000 pieces of the latest generation of equipment to far and “plans to maintain this trend over the next several years.” It said that it had allocated approximately 400 megawatts of capacity for self-mining through regional hosting partners.
Bitcoin hash rate increase slows – for the time being
As previously noted by The Block, although Bitcoin’s hash rate has gradually regained half of its June crash loss, Bitcoin mining companies with prior operations in China still have a long way to go in terms of migration. This is due to a worldwide capacity crunch.
Compute North’s CEO, Dave Perrill, told The Block in an email last month that the company is transferring a number of Chinese customers. “However, since we were already sold out in Q3 and Q4, [the] migrations for these customers will occur next year. Deployments ranging from 30MW to 150MW are taking place “‘ He said.
This may assist to explain why Bitcoin’s hashing power growth has slowed — at least temporarily — but is expected to restart at a faster pace early next year. Bitcoin’s mining difficulty was increased by only 1% on Tuesday, but the average Bitcoin hash rate remained at 145 EH/s, according to The Block’s Data Dashboard.
While US-based colocation providers are driving a North American mining infrastructure boom to meet growth and relocation needs, Bitcoin mining companies are also constructing facilities in the area via joint ventures. This has aided it in displacing China as the Bitcoin mining location with the greatest market share.
BIT Mining, formerly known as 500.com and with significant operations in China, said on Monday that it is spending an additional $11 million in its Ohio mining facility, which is being built in partnership with Viking Data Centers. The additional investment will boost the facility’s capacity by 65 MW, bringing the overall capacity to 150 MW.
Also Read: The US Treasury Department Declares That Digital Assets Undermine Sanctions
Wallets