(Reuters) -U.S. video platform and cloud services provider Rumble is considering an offer of about $1.17 billion (1 billion euros) for German AI cloud group Northern Data, according to statements from both companies.
Rumble said on Sunday that a deal would give it control of Northern Data's GPU-rich cloud business, Taiga, and its large-scale data center arm, Ardent, with plans to integrate both into its own operations.
The Taiga cloud unit holds a significant inventory of Nvidia GPU chips, including
around 20,480 H100s and over 2,000 H200s.
Northern Data said on Monday that its board is evaluating Rumble's potential offer and is open for further discussions.
Rumble is considering offering 2.319 shares for each Northern Data share, both companies said.
The proposed offer values Northern Data at about $18.3 per share, based on Reuters calculations, and represents a discount of about 32% to the German company's last closing price in Frankfurt.
Reuters calculated the potential total deal value at approximately $1.17 billion.
A deal on the current terms would result in Northern Data shareholders owning about 33.3% of Rumble's shares.
Both companies said that a final offer, if made, is expected to be at a higher valuation.
Stablecoin platform Tether, the majority shareholder of Northern Data, has expressed support for the transaction, according to the statements.
A potential offer assumes that Northern Data's crypto mining unit will be divested prior to the completion of the deal, with proceeds from the sale used to reduce the existing loan extended by Tether to Northern Data.
"Following consummation of the potential transaction, Tether would become an important customer of Rumble, with a multi-year commitment to purchase GPUs," Rumble said.
However, the companies said there is no certainty that the discussions will ultimately result in a formal offer for the German group.
(1 euro = $1.1664)
(Reporting by Surbhi Misra and Shubham Kalia in Bengaluru; Editing by Rashmi Aich and Sherry Jacob-Phillips)
