Canaan Creative

Canaan Creative is a Bitcoin company in the Mining Hardware category, founded in 2013 by N.G. Zhang.

The Idea

Turn Bitcoin mining from hobbyist GPUs into purpose-built silicon. Zhang's Avalon project shipped the first working Bitcoin ASIC miner in January 2013, beating the vaporware competitors of the era and formally incorporating as Canaan Creative in Hangzhou that year.

Early Traction

The Avalon1 was the first consumer Bitcoin ASIC ever delivered, and early units famously paid for themselves in days. Canaan also open-sourced early chip designs, seeding much of the Chinese ASIC industry that followed, and grew into one of the top mining hardware makers alongside Bitmain and MicroBT.

Peak Stats

Roughly 22% of global mining machine market share at the time of its November 2019 Nasdaq IPO (ticker CAN), which raised about $90 million and made Canaan both the first major Bitcoin company and the first Chinese blockchain company to list on a US exchange. Revenue reached $269.3 million in 2024.

Status Today

Still public on Nasdaq but a distant third behind Bitmain (80%+ share) and MicroBT. It now ships the Avalon A16 series, runs a growing self-mining business, and has completed pilot ASIC production in the US to serve the North American market.