Microsoft has accepted Horizon 1, the first 50-megawatt AI Cloud deployment under IREN's five-year, $9.7 billion cloud-services agreement, while NVIDIA has granted Exemplar Cloud status to the same GB300 NVL72 infrastructure after testing it. IREN shares rose 10.41% to $48.22 in early trading Thursday after the announcement, after opening at $45.97, closing Wednesday at $43.67 and reaching an intraday high of $49.13. About 17.71 million shares had traded by 1:51:44 p.m. UTC, versus an average daily volume of 45.36 million. Horizon 1 is the first of four 50 MW direct-to-chip liquid-cooled deployments IREN is scheduled to deliver to Microsoft in 2026 at its Childress, Texas campus, with Horizons 2 through 4 still due later this year. The milestone reinforces IREN's shift from Bitcoin mining toward AI infrastructure, where management is targeting more than $4 billion in AI Cloud annualized run-rate revenue by year-end 2026, up from a prior $3.7 billion target, with about 85% of that goal under contract. Analysts and investors are now focused on whether IREN can deliver the remaining Microsoft facilities on schedule as it aims for 480 MW of AI Cloud capacity in 2026 and 1.2 GW in 2027.