Bitcoin miner MARA buys majority stake in Exaion to grow AI business Nellius Irene | usagoldmines.com

MARA Holdings Inc. is about to sign a $168 million deal to buy most of EDF’s Exaion, making its biggest step from Bitcoin mining into artificial intelligence infrastructure.

The company’s SEC filing says MARA’s French unit, MARA France SAS, will buy new and existing shares to own 64% of Exaion, a high-performance computing and AI infrastructure firm. The deal should close in late 2025 or early 2026, once regulators in France and Canada approve it.

MARA buys majority stake in Exaion to grow AI business

MARA will shift from being known purely as a large-scale Bitcoin miner to becoming a major player in the AI infrastructure industry by committing to a multi-step investment plan. 

The company will acquire 4.1 million newly issued shares in Exaion, a French company operating high-performance computing and cloud services for demanding digital workloads, through a €115 million deal. The company will also buy 1.2 million existing shares from EDF Pulse Holding and other minority owners for €33 million. €23 million will be paid at the closing of the deal, and €10 million in 2027 if Exaion meets certain agreed performance targets. 

This deal will give the Bitcoin mining firm the power to guide the company’s growth strategy and future direction while still keeping EDF as a minority partner through a controlling interest of 64% in Exaion.

MARA also plans to raise its ownership stake to approximately 75% by acquiring an additional 3.9 million shares in Exaion for about €110 million in March 2027. This second phase will ensure there remains a link between Exaion’s utility heritage and its expanding role in technology by giving MARA even greater control over Exaion’s operations while keeping EDF’s minority position intact.

Depending on how long it takes to meet all closing conditions, the company expects the first phase to close either in the final quarter of 2025 or the first quarter of 2026. This is because the transaction is still subject to approvals from regulators in France and Canada. 

MARA carefully planned this deal to enter a sector that is growing quickly and to exploit the opportunities that go beyond the sometimes-volatile revenue streams of cryptocurrency mining.

Exaion provides advanced computing power through high-performance data centers and specialized cloud platforms. These facilities handle complex and heavy workloads essential for running artificial intelligence applications, big data analysis, and other resource-intensive digital operations. 

As more organizations demand tighter control over where their data is stored and how it is processed, MARA’s focus on digital sovereignty comes in handy. Rather than outsourcing everything to global hyperscale providers, the company’s clients can process and store sensitive information within secure systems that comply with regional data protection rules.

MARA is stepping into a market that complements its existing expertise in managing large-scale, energy-intensive computing operations by acquiring a controlling stake in Exaion. The company will focus on AI inference (running and using already trained models to perform tasks) instead of investing heavily in training AI models from scratch, which requires massive resources.

AI growth offers new income for Bitcoin miners

There is a sharp rise in demand for computing power capable of handling the enormous workloads required by advanced AI applications, as the market is growing at an extraordinary pace. 

MARA focuses on AI infrastructure services that can be delivered to a broader range of clients, while competitors such as Core Scientific and Hut 8 target hyperscale cloud providers instead. 

Since MARA is not entirely dependent on large cloud providers to generate business, it can engage with the AI market in a way that is more controlled and potentially more profitable. The company can offer tailored solutions that meet each client’s specific computing and data needs by positioning itself to work directly with customers.

MARA is also continuing to pursue an aggressive Bitcoin treasury strategy that has become a defining feature of its overall business model. To buy more Bitcoin while continuing to hold onto every coin it mines, it raised $950 million through equity and debt financing. 

The announcement of MARA’s deal with EDF’s Exaion gave the company a market value of $5.8 billion after its shares rose 1.8% to $15.67 in the New York trading session. MARA will receive strong positions in both the rapidly evolving AI sector and the established but still volatile world of cryptocurrency mining if the acquisition goes through as planned.

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This articles is written by : Nermeen Nabil Khear Abdelmalak

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