HIVE Digital solidifies its position in sovereign AI: a $220 million contract and an Nvidia Blackwell cluster in Canada
Mining company HIVE Digital Technologies is making a decisive move toward business diversification by signing a three-year contract worth $220 million. The agreement involves deploying high-performance GPU infrastructure for sovereign artificial intelligence in Canada.
The project will be implemented through its subsidiary BUZZ High Performance Computing. A total of 2,304 Nvidia Grace Blackwell accelerators will be installed at a facility in Merritt, British Columbia. This is not just an equipment upgrade — it is a transition to a next-generation architecture that delivers exponential performance gains for AI tasks.
Government Contracts and Enterprise AI
The computing power will be used to serve enterprise AI models for the Canadian company Cohere. Special emphasis is placed on sovereign AI: solutions will be tailored for government agencies and businesses that require full data control and compliance with national security standards. The infrastructure launch is scheduled for late 2026 to early 2027.
This contract sends a strong signal to the market. Traditional mining companies, which have access to cheap electricity and established logistics, are increasingly repurposing their capacity for cloud computing and the AI sector. Unlike the speculative hype around memecoins, here we see long-term contracts backed by real demand.
My opinion: The HIVE deal is not just an attempt to capitalize on the AI hype. It is a strategic move that could serve as a template for other public mining companies. If the project is successfully launched on schedule, HIVE will gain not just a new revenue stream, but also the status of a key infrastructure partner for government AI initiatives in North America. The market will likely view this positively, although there are still nearly two years until launch — and much could change in that time.