The recent spike in the price of Bitcoin increased interest in Bitcoin mining which seems to have dwindled after the block reward halving in July.

According to the International Marketing Manager at Bitmain, Nishant Sharma, Bitcoin mining has continued unaffected by the block halving but the recent push in the price of Bitcoin in the first few days of 2017 drew more interest to the sector.

“If Google search trends are telling, the interest in “bitcoin mining” surged in 2013 and hasn’t been the same because increasingly more people are involved in or aware of Bitcoin mining since then,”

Sharma says in a mail to 8btc.

He adds:

“Bitcoin mining continues to increase and the rising network difficulty is a proof of that. A rising Bitcoin price reduces the time it takes for miners to break-even and so makes mining more profitable. So, the recent surge in Bitcoin price has increased interest in Bitcoin mining.”

Since July last year, the coming of the block reward halving has been cited as a key factor that forced several Bitcoin miners to quit the effort at mining the digital currency as they say the activities are no longer profitable.

In China, where the process seems to continue without much concerns being raised about the possible effect of the halving process, miners there are considered successful because of the availability of cheap electricity.

However, Chandler Guo, a Chinese angel investor in Bitcoin and Ethereum startups has denied that electricity is neither cheap nor easily accessible in China. He also hinted at a new trend in which some energy companies in China now use their abandoned electricity to mine Bitcoin instead of selling it out to private miners.

Despite the increased investments in Bitcoin mining farms in China as well as abroad, Sharma expects to see more Bitcoin mining farms globally in the future.