All posts tagged: highperformance

Canadian universities collaborate to build high-performance supercomputing system

Canadian universities collaborate to build high-performance supercomputing system

Published by skeptic

Simon Fraser University (SFU) and Queen’s University are partnering to design and build a national sovereign, secure, and sustainable high-performance supercomputing system that will keep Canadian data and intellectual property in Canadian hands. The two universities have signed a memorandum of understanding, seizing the opportunity to combine unrivalled national expertise to provide world-leading high-performance supercomputing and services for academia, government, and industry. Dugan O’Neil, vice-president of research & innovation at SFU, explained: “Canada needs secure, world‑class computing infrastructure to lead in the next generation of artificial intelligence. “By partnering with Queen’s, we’re bringing together the expertise, talent, and the national-scale facilities needed for a sovereign platform that Canadians can trust.” The growing need for high-performance supercomputing AI supercomputers are the powerful engines that train AI models, analyse massive amounts of information, and support innovations in areas such as health care, clean energy, defence, manufacturing, dual-use technology, and public safety. As the demand for AI grows, so does the need for strong computing infrastructure that keeps data secure and ensures it stays within Canadian borders. SFU …

HPCTRAIN to build EU high-performance computing workforce

HPCTRAIN to build EU high-performance computing workforce

Published by skeptic

New traineeship initiative aims to strengthen high-performance computing (HPC) skills across Europe and connect young professionals with the growing supercomputing sector. Europe has launched a new initiative to strengthen its high-performance computing workforce as demand for advanced computing expertise continues to grow across science, industry and government. The HPCTRAIN project, launched by the European High-Performance Computing Joint Undertaking (EuroHPC JU), will offer traineeships for early-career professionals seeking to develop practical HPC skills and gain experience with supercomputing technologies. The programme began in January 2026 and is scheduled to run for four years. Its organisers say the initiative is designed to help address Europe’s shortage of skilled specialists capable of working with high-performance computing systems, which underpin fields ranging from artificial intelligence to climate modelling and advanced manufacturing. The initiative has received €5m funding through the European Union’s Digital Europe Programme following the call DIGITAL-EUROHPC-JU-2022-TRAINING-03. Expanding Europe’s supercomputing ambitions The EuroHPC JU is a joint initiative involving the European Union and participating countries, created to coordinate investment in supercomputing infrastructure and research across the region. In …

High-performance large language models for Europe

High-performance large language models for Europe

Published by skeptic

The High-Performance Language Technologies (HPLT) project is developing very large-scale multilingual resources for large language models and machine translation. Massive text collections for pre-training are the ‘crude oil’ of the large language model (LLM) era. The process of ‘refining’ high-quality datasets from web data at scale presupposes computational infrastructure and technological muscle that is often characteristic of corporate environments, as evidenced, for example, by some notable generally available pre-training datasets: C4,¹ FineWeb 1 & 2,2,3 MADLAD-400,⁴ or Nemotron-CC.⁵ With a few notable exceptions, this line of work tends to capitalise on the English language. Here, we present the open-source results6,9,10 of the European R&D consortium HPLT – a project that has been funded under the auspices of the Horizon Europe programme in 2022–2025. Together with a myriad of additional results, HPLT has produced massive pre-training datasets of high-quality texts in close to 200 distinct language–script combinations. Its 2025 monolingual data release, HPLT 3.0, comprises some 30 trillion sub-word tokens in total, of which close to half represent languages other than English. We make this resource …

High-performance computing market set to reach bn by 2030

High-performance computing market set to reach $91bn by 2030

Published by skeptic

High-performance computing has evolved into a cornerstone of the modern digital economy. Driven by the AI race, the need for real-time big data analytics, and the widespread transition to cloud-based supercomputing, high-performance computing solutions are now essential for competitive advantage in sectors ranging from life sciences to financial modelling. A new report reveals that the HPC market is projected to reach $91.38bn by 2030, growing at a steady CAGR of 10.4% over the forecast period from 2026 to 2030. This signals significant market growth, as the market was valued at $55.88bn in 2025. Key drivers for the huge uptake of high-performance computing The report identified several key drivers of the high-performance computing boom. These complex technologies and discoveries rely on it to power them as easily, quickly, and cost-effectively as possible. AI and machine learning Training large language models and complex AI frameworks requires massive parallel processing power. HPC provides the necessary infrastructure for these high-density compute tasks, making it indispensable for the next generation of artificial intelligence. Cloud computing The “democratisation” of supercomputing is …

EPI’s path to innovative high-performance computing

EPI’s path to innovative high-performance computing

Published by skeptic

The European Processor Initiative is working to achieve digital sovereignty in high-performance computing by developing European-made processors. Almost ten years ago, the European Commission decided it needed a special Framework Partnership Agreement (FPA) that would tackle the idea of a European-made processor – if not produced in Europe, then certainly designed and thought of in Europe. Even before creating a special Joint Undertaking, that would synchronise and plot the way for European HPC efforts – the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking – the European Commission included such a plan into the Horizon 2020 programme, the most expansive research and innovation funding programme on the continent. The European Processor Initiative A group of industry and research participants formed a consortium, called the European Processor Initiative (EPI), to apply to the topic under the LEIT: ICT work programme. EPI then won the FPA and started off in 2018, under the Specific Grant Agreement 1 (SGA1). The specific challenge of the topic was supporting the creation of a world-class European High-Performance Computing and Big Data ecosystem built on two exascale …

SAFELOOP pioneers safer, high-performance Li-ion EV battery

SAFELOOP pioneers safer, high-performance Li-ion EV battery

Published by skeptic

The SAFELOOP project is committed to developing a safe, sustainable, and high-performance lithium-ion (Li-Ion) battery for the European EV industry. SAFELOOP (Securely Advancing Future EVs with Li-Ion batteries through Optimized Pathways) is a 36-month project launched in June 2024, bringing together 15 partners from 11 countries. SAFELOOP is funded by Horizon Europe – the European Union’s flagship research and innovation funding programme. SAFELOOP secured €5m of funding from the European Commission. Fig. 1: Project partners and location map Growing urgency for more efficient and reliable energy storage In a mobile and fast-paced society, the demand for energy storage solutions has never been more critical. As we strive to build a sustainable future relying on renewable energy sources, the need for efficient and reliable energy storage becomes paramount. The SAFELOOP project is reshaping how batteries for electric vehicles (EVs) are made. The project is developing innovative key battery components – anodes, cathodes, separators, and electrolytes – using recycled materials provided by its consortium members. These will be combined into battery packs designed for e-buses. SAFELOOP aims …