Core Scientific, the largest mining host in North America, is about to get bigger after finalizing a purchase of 112,800 top-of-the-line application specific circuit (ASIC) bitcoin miners from Bitmain.
Revealed exclusively to CoinDesk, the company, which provides mining hosting services alongside its own mining operations, will receive S19, S19 Pro, S19J and S19J Pro Antminers per the sale to double its mining machine inventory. The agreement also authorizes Core Scientific to take in and repair Bitmain machines under warranty.
Core Scientific will use half of the machines for their own bitcoin mining efforts; the other half are under contract with existing clients.
This shipment and future ones like it could help Core Scientific expand their global share of Bitcoin’s hashrate from 5% to 12%, CEO Kevin Turner told CoinDesk.
Turner’s forecast aligns with North America’s growing presence in the bitcoin mining industry. Along with Core Scientific, miners like Marathon, Riot, Blockcap, Gryphon and others have made strides in expanding their individual operations this year.
Turner doesn’t expect this trend to stop soon given the interest from new, high-net worth players in the industry.
“We do expect this trend to continue as we’re witnessing an increasing number of publicly traded companies, large family offices, and hedge funds looking for enterprise grade, trustworthy and credible mining operations in North America. While other countries have been early adopters of digital assets, blockchain technology and mining, we believe that the United States, specifically, has an interest in being a leader in these spaces,” he said.