Cryptocurrency mining company Iren (IREN) said it will exit the bitcoin mining business by the end of the year and shift its focus to artificial intelligence infrastructure.

On Nov. 7, blockchain media outlet Coinpost reported that Iren plans to complete the transition from bitcoin mining to the AI data centre business within the year.

Iren mined 402 bitcoins from July to September, down sharply from 2,039 bitcoins in the same period a year earlier. Average operating hash rate also fell to 8.8 exahash per second from 45.3 exahash per second. The company is selling mined bitcoin daily and had no bitcoin on its balance sheet as of the end of September.

The drop in mining profits was also clear. Bitcoin mining revenue for July to September was $28 million, down 58 percent from $67 million in the previous quarter and down 88 percent from $233 million a year earlier. Iren said it expects to continue bitcoin mining on a limited basis while it transitions to AI cloud.

By contrast, its AI cloud business is growing rapidly. Under a delivery agreement for its "Horizon 1" facility signed with Microsoft, Iren posted revenue of $200 million, up 182 percent from the previous quarter. Operating annual recurring revenue (ARR), calculated by annualising revenue from running active GPUs at contracted unit prices at full utilisation for one year, came to $1 billion.

Iren plans to bring online facilities capable of generating at least $4 billion in contracted ARR by the end of January 2027. As a result, future performance is expected to be driven more by AI infrastructure contract execution and facility start-up schedules than by bitcoin mining.

Its asset mix is also being reshaped around data centres. Iren said total assets stood at $20.6 billion as of the end of September, including $6 billion in data centre-related assets. Last month, there was also news that it had signed a long-term cloud contract with Anthropic.

Its net loss also narrowed from the previous quarter. Net loss for July to September was $263 million, down from a loss of $684 million in the prior quarter. In the prior quarter, an impairment loss from scrapping mining equipment widened the loss.

Co-founder and co-chief executive Daniel Roberts (대니얼 로버츠) said the company owns its own land, power and data centres, allowing it to broaden funding options for growth and control its own growth pace. Iren is expected to focus more on meeting AI cloud demand and using its data centre assets than on running bitcoin mining facilities.