Data center infrastructure company Akron Energy has raised $110 million in a private funding round led by Bluesky Capital Management, with participation from Kestrel 0x1, Nural Capital and Florence Capital. The funding will be used to acquire an additional 200-megawatt capacity across new data centers in Ohio, North Carolina and Texas, as well as to develop an artificial intelligence cloud service project at Akron’s data center in Norway. Akron Energy's US data center portfolio is largely occupied by institutional-grade bitcoin mining companies, and the company's business model focuses on acquiring distressed data center assets across the globe. CEO Josh Payne said that there has been a "meteoric rise in AI applications" and potential growth and adoption for bitcoin in mainstream institutional markets, making specialized data centers like Akron's "poised to continue scaling exponentially".