Volta exits stealth with $10bn AI infrastructure partnership, leases Norway capacity from Bitdeer

A new AI infrastructure company has emerged from stealth with plans to build a vertically integrated platform spanning power, data centers, compute, and software. Volta, as the firm is called, has launched with a $10 billion strategic partnership with an unnamed "leading frontier AI lab," with the first phase of deployment set to take place at Bitdeer's campus in Norway.

The company says it has a pipeline of 1GW of near-term power capacity across North America and Europe, with a target of 5GW by 2030. Volta was founded by CEO Ricard Boada and chief corporate development officer Sofia Gumuzio, both of whom previously held positions at Brookfield. The firm aims to combine institutional capital, powered land, data centers, compute, software, and operations under one roof, positioning itself as a one-stop platform for AI-scale infrastructure.

"Compute has become a new infrastructure asset class, with AI models and applications as the verticals built on top," said Boada. "Every technology revolution has run on a physical layer beneath it. Railways carried industrialization. Our ambition is to build the utility of compute so that compute works as reliably and invisibly as electricity, while being priced transparently and built to endure."

Volta has secured Series A funding led by Azora, Andreessen Horowitz, Altimeter, and Nvidia, with participation from the family office of Michael Dell and Matter Venture Partners. The funding round values the company at $2.4 billion. In addition, the firm has secured $5 billion in financing from real estate and infrastructure investment manager Azora.

"AI is transforming compute from a technology product into critical infrastructure," added Gumuzio. "Meeting that demand requires a platform that can mobilize infrastructure capital, secure power, and execute at industrial scale while moving at the pace of AI innovation. That's what Volta was built to do."

As part of its initial deployment, Nasdaq-listed Bitdeer has executed a 16-year colocation lease with a subsidiary of Volta. The agreement covers 121MW of IT capacity, supported by an estimated 133MW gross capacity, at Bitdeer's Tydal facility in Norway, a former cryptomine. Volta's customer at the site will be the unnamed "leading AI lab," with Dell Technologies serving as the technology provider. The campus will host Nvidia's Vera Rubin hardware.

The lease represents approximately $4.7 billion in contracted revenue over the initial 16-year base term, with an eight-year renewal option that could increase the total contract value to approximately $8 billion over 24 years. Volta's obligations are expected to be supported by a credit backstop in the form of Letters of Credit arranged by affiliates of J.P. Morgan and another unnamed "top-tier global financial institution," totaling approximately $1.3 billion.

Capacity will be delivered in two equal-sized phases across four data halls, with Phase I scheduled to launch by the end of December 2026 and Phase II by the end of March 2027. Bitdeer is also developing two additional data halls, totaling 47MW gross, for future AI/HPC use cases in the second half of 2027, which could bring the site's total capacity to 180MW.

"This agreement is a key milestone in Bitdeer's evolution as a global AI infrastructure platform," said Bitdeer CFO Michael G. Potter. "This project will incorporate leading-edge Nvidia GPU technology and frontier models from a leading AI lab into a data center that is powered exclusively through highly reliable, carbon-free energy sources. Bitdeer has been present in Norway since 2018 and is very proud to be leading the effort to bring AI data centers at scale to Norway and Europe."

Tydal is one of two sites Bitdeer operates in Norway, alongside an 84MW cryptomine in Molde. The company acquired both facilities in 2024 after previously leasing them. Located within the Kirkvollen industrial site, the Tydal facility plans to utilize excess heat for food production on a neighboring property. Bitdeer announced plans to convert the Tydal site toward HPC workloads last year and appointed a contractor in April to begin the conversion process. In February, the company said it was in "advanced stages of negotiations" with potential colocation tenants for the site.

According to a report from Bloomberg, the AI lab involved in the Volta partnership is Anthropic, though neither company has confirmed this. In total, Bitdeer claims to have 3GW of capacity in operation and development across the US, Norway, Bhutan, and Canada. The company is also converting sites in Knoxville, Tennessee (37MW) and Wenatchee, Washington (13MW), both due for completion by the end of the year, and is evaluating the potential to convert a cryptomine in Rockdale, Texas (563MW). Bitdeer also lists plans for HPC sites in Clarington (570MW) and Niles (300MW) in Ohio, with the latter expected to go live by the end of 2028.

The emergence of Volta and its partnership with Bitdeer underscores a broader trend in which dedicated AI infrastructure firms are raising large amounts of capital to secure power and data center capacity at scale. By bundling power procurement, construction, and operations into a single platform, companies like Volta are attempting to address the growing demand for compute that is both reliable and scalable, while also bringing financial structures that resemble traditional infrastructure investing to the AI sector.