By Mario Toneguzzi
Modern Mining, a unique Bitcoin mining company, has been established in Calgary with plans to build a flagship facility in Medicine Hat using 100 per cent immersion cooling technology and the most efficient mining hardware in the world.
The company is being operated by Shawn Banack, Chief Executive Officer, Jason McCagherty, Chief Operating Officer, Ryan Chernesky, Chief Financial Officer and Sebastian Elawny, Chief Legal Officer.
“All four of us – the directors that got together – have been involved in crypto (currency) for several years,” says Chernesky. “I started in early 2017. I heard about Bitcoin years before that but like most people didn’t think too much of it. I wasn’t really computer savvy so I never got involved with it until about 2017.
“I bought some Bitcoin which then allowed me to look at the other alternative coins and I’ve been in it ever since.”
Modern Mining was the brainchild of Banack and McCagherty. They were more involved in the mining space of the crypto market.
“The flagship facility is the first of its kind that we’re aware of in Canada. The first immersion Bitcoin mining company,” says Chernesky.
“Alberta’s power supply is deregulated. So Medicine Hat has their own power supply source and they’re vertically integrated . . . Medicine Hat had favourable power supply costs. We struck a deal with them to utilize their power. It’s about half of the cost that it would cost us to set up in Calgary even though our head office is in Calgary.”
On August 31, the company closed on its first tranche of financing, raising close to $3 million, which is enough to open up the facility. The plan is to have the Medicine Hat facility up and running by mid-November.
“There’s a bit of trouble in the financial system right now. Most people don’t earn any interest at the bank. The stock market dividend rates are down. Pretty much historically as low as they’ve ever been. So where do you earn income these days?,” says Chernesky.
“We believe there’s a new financial system being born. There’s a lot of evolution for it to go through still but that’s why we’re so bullish on what we’re doing. We believe it’s going to be the base layer of the financial system into the future.”
