Applied Digital has signed a 15-year take-or-pay lease agreement for its fourth artificial intelligence (AI) factory campus, Polaris Forge 3, with the same US-based investment-grade hyperscaler it signed for Delta Forge 1 in April 2026.
Important points:
- Applied Digital has signed a 15-year, $7.5 billion lease on Polaris Forge 3, with total contract revenue of $31 billion.
- APLD currently has 1,200 MW of contracted AI capacity across four campuses, 65% of which is backed by investment-grade hyperscalers.
- Polaris Forge 3 is scheduled to begin operations in August 2027, and APLD will actively market the additional 1.7 GW of power.
Applied Digital boosts total contracted revenue to $31 billion with fourth AI campus deal
Applied Digital Corporation (Nasdaq: APLD), a Dallas-based artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure provider, Bitcoin miner, and data center developer, announced the deal on May 20, 2026. The contract covers 300 megawatts of critical IT load at Polaris Forge 3, a campus located in the northern part of the state and supported by approximately 430 MW of grid-connected utility power.
The base period value of this lease is approximately $7.5 billion, with a potential value of up to $18.2 billion if all renewal options are exercised.
The release details that the deal brings Applied Digital’s total contracted lease revenue to $31 billion across the four AI Factory campuses, or $73 billion including all renewal options. The total contracted critical IT load now amounts to 1,200 MW net, with a total power capacity of approximately 1,670 MW. Approximately 65% of its contracted revenue is supported by U.S.-based investment-grade hyperscalers.
Wes Cummins, Chairman and CEO of Applied Digital, said the partnership is a continuation of a proven framework. “This second 300 MW lease with the same US-based high investment grade hyperscaler we partnered with on Delta Forge 1 reflects the confidence we have built through disciplined execution and our ability to consistently drive large-scale AI infrastructure projects,” Cummins explained.
The company signed a lease worth 1.2 GW of capacity over an 11-month period. Cummins added that Applied Digital is actively marketing more than 1.7 GW of additional grid-connected utility power across recently added sites and existing sites.
Polaris Forge 3 covers over 600 acres and is designed for high-density AI workloads. The campus uses Applied Digital’s proprietary waterless cooling technology, high-density power delivery, and advanced liquid cooling architecture. Operations are scheduled to start in August 2027.
This campus follows the same AI Factory model applied in Polaris Forge 1, Polaris Forge 2, and Delta Forge 1. Applied Digital describes the model as reproducible and purpose-built to support large-scale AI training and inference infrastructure at the compute density demanded by next-generation systems.
Applied Digital is one of many Bitcoin mining operators that has moved primarily towards AI infrastructure products and high performance computing (HPC) workloads. APLD stock has risen 6.8% in the past five days and is up more than 85% year-to-date.
