Iren, $9.7 billion deal with Microsoft…shares surge 30%

Nasdaq-listed Bitcoin (BTC) mining company Iren (IREN)'s stock surged on news of a large artificial intelligence (AI) cloud contract with Microsoft.

On the 3rd (local time), The Block reported that Iren said it had signed a 5-year, $9.7 billion GPU cloud service contract with Microsoft. The deal included a prepayment condition equal to 20% of the total amount. Through the contract, Microsoft will be able to access Iren's Nvidia GB300 GPU resources. Iren's stock rose as much as 30% in pre-market trading.

Iren also said it had signed a separate $5.8 billion supply agreement with Dell Technologies to secure GPUs and related equipment. These GPUs are scheduled to be deployed progressively to a 750-megawatt (MW) campus in Childress, Texas, by 2026. The new facilities will also include a 200 MW immersion-cooled data center.

Iren co-founder Daniel Roberts said, "This collaboration demonstrates the reliability and scalability of Iren's vertically integrated AI cloud platform," adding, "the partnership with Microsoft opens the door to the global hyperscaler market."

Research firm Bernstein analyzed in a late-September report that Iren's AI cloud business expansion could generate $500 million in annual revenue by early 2026. Bernstein had raised Iren's price target to $75 at the time, and said the recent surge reached that target.