Applied Digital Lands $7.5 Billion AI Computing Contract, Shares Surge 12%

Applied Digital (NASDAQ: APLD) is a data center operator specializing in AI and high-performance computing infrastructure, using long-term leases to secure major cloud customers. Such contracts improve visibility into future revenue and underscore how demand for AI computing is intensifying competition for power and data center capacity.

Applied Digital said on April 23, 2026, that it had signed an unnamed U.S. investment-grade hyperscaler to take 300 megawatts of critical IT load at its Delta Forge 1 campus. The 15-year lease is worth about $7.5 billion, lifting the company's contracted revenue to more than $23 billion. Its shares jumped more than 12% intraday.