Microsoft signs $9.7 billion contract with IREN for Nvidia chips

Data centre owner and operator IREN said on Monday it has signed a nearly $9.7 billion cloud services contract with Microsoft to provide the tech giant with access to Nvidia’s GB300 processors over a five-year period.

The move is the latest attempt by Microsoft to boost AI and data centre infrastructure at a time when AI demand is outstripping cloud capacity at Big Tech companies.

Shares of IREN surged about 18% in premarket trading after the announcement, with the company also entering into an agreement with Dell Technologies to purchase the chips and ancillary equipment for about $5.8 billion.

IREN expects the GB300 processors to be deployed in phases through 2026 at its 750-megawatt campus in Childress, Texas and said its contract with Microsoft includes a 20% prepayment.

Meanwhile Artificial intelligence giant Nvidia’s most advanced chips will be reserved for US companies and kept out of China and other countries, US President Donald Trump said.

During a taped interview that aired on Sunday on CBS’ “60 Minutes” programme and in comments to reporters aboard Air Force One, Trump said only US customers should have access to the top-end Blackwell chips offered by Nvidia, the world’s most valuable company by market capitalization. “The most advanced, we will not let anybody have them other than the United States,” he told CBS, echoing remarks made earlier to reporters as he returned to Washington from a weekend in Florida. “We don’t give (the Blackwell) chip to other people,” he said during the flight.

Agencies