In brief
- Core Scientific announced that it has bought 17,595 Bitcoin miners from Bitmain.
- S19 is Bitmain's latest model, designed to be more efficient.
- The Bitcoin halving occurred on May 11, which cut the rewards for mining Bitcoin in half.
American Bitcoin mining farm Core Scientific today announced that it has bought 17,595 Bitcoin miners from Bitmain, the troubled Chinese Bitcoin mining manufacturer. This is the largest number of Bitmain’s S19 miners bought by a single blockchain company, it claims.
The S19 is Bitmain’s newest and most powerful Bitcoin miner. Bitcoin miners are powerful, purpose-built computers used to confirm transactions on the Bitcoin blockchain; miners are rewarded with Bitcoin for solving computationally intensive puzzles. But the race to mine Bitcoin gets more difficult when more people start mining.
Companies like Core Scientific have to keep on buying new Bitcoin miners to outpace everyone else. They buy lots of miners so that they earn lots of Bitcoin.
On May 11, the Bitcoin halving occurred, cutting the rewards for mining Bitcoin in half, meaning that revenues of the mining companies would halve if they didn’t buy new miners. This happens every four years, and means that mining farms must buy more powerful miners to remain competitive.
Core Scientific is one of the biggest mining companies in the US; its miners use over 450 megawatts of power. It also mines other cryptocurrencies.
“With market-beating long-term power contracts in place and the most powerful miners ready to be deployed at a moment’s notice, Core Scientific is well-positioned to facilitate our clients’ digital mining needs at a considerably faster pace than the competition,” said Kevin Turner, president & CEO of Core Scientific.
Most Bitcoin mining farms are located in China, where the costs of running Bitcoin mining farms are lower. That’s because the electricity is cheaper. Mining farms use cheap hydroelectric power in the rainy season and use icy winters to save on cooling costs.
Bitmain, the company from which Core Scientific bought the miners, is in turmoil because of a dispute between its two founders, Wijan Wu and Micree Zhan. The spat has threatened the production and delivery of new miners, which were already in short supply.
For the next four months, Core Scientific’s newly bought miners will be distributed among Core Scientific’s 655,000 square foot network of data centers, which is spread across the US. It said that the first batch of miners are operational today.