Riot Platforms Taps Data Center Veteran to Expand Beyond Bitcoin Mining

Riot Platforms (RIOT) has hired industry veteran Jonathan Gibbs as its Chief Data Center Officer, marking a strategic move by the bitcoin miner to branch out beyond crypto into the broader data infrastructure business. Gibbs brings over 15 years of experience and a résumé that includes designing and building more than one gigawatt of data center capacity across North America, Europe and Asia. He most recently served as Executive Vice President at Prime Data Centers, where he led projects across the U.S. Now, he’s tasked with launching Riot’s new data center platform aimed at companies that require massive computing power to support cloud services and artificial intelligence. The company plans to build out non-bitcoin-focused facilities, leveraging 1.7 gigawatts of power capacity it already controls. The company’s CEO, Jason Les, said the new initiative will “aggressively scale” to meet surging demand. If successful, Riot could join a growing list of former mining firms repositioning themselves as key players in the AI and cloud infrastructure boom.