European High-Performance Computing Joint Undertaking

The European High-Performance Computing Joint Undertaking (EuroHPC JU) is a public-private partnership in High Performance Computing (HPC), enabling the pooling of European Union–level resources with the resources of participating EU Member States and participating associated states of the Horizon Europe and Digital Europe programmes, as well as private stakeholders. The Joint Undertaking has the twin stated aims of developing a pan-European supercomputing infrastructure, and supporting research and innovation activities. Located in Luxembourg City, Luxembourg, the Joint Undertaking started operating in November 2018 under the control of the European Commission and became autonomous in 2020.

European High-Performance Computing Joint Undertaking
EuroHPC JU
Joint Undertaking overview
Formed6 November 2018 (2018-11-06) (began operations)
HeadquartersDrosbach Building
12E rue Guillaume Kroll
Gasperich, Luxembourg City, L-1882
Luxembourg
49°34′47″N 6°06′41″E / 49.579640°N 6.111510°E / 49.579640; 6.111510
Joint Undertaking executive
  • Anders Dam Jensen, Executive Director
Key document
Websiteeurohpc-ju.europa.eu
Map

History edit

In June 2016, EU Member State leaders, meeting in the European Council called for greater coordination of EU efforts on high-performance computing as part of the EU's wider Digital Single Market strategy.[1] The European Declaration on High-Performance Computing was launched in Rome in March 2017, initially signed by seven EU Member States (France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal and Spain) committed to upgrading European computing power.[2][3] In June 2018, the Council of the EU endorsed the European Commission’s proposal to establish the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking.[4] On 3 July 2018, the European Parliament voted in favour of the Commission’s proposal to create a European High Performance Computing Joint Undertaking.[4] The proposal was formally adopted by the Council of the European Union on 28 September 2018.[4]

The Executive Director was appointed on 15 May 2020 and the Joint Undertaking became autonomous from the European Commission on 23 September 2020.[5]

The EuroHPC Joint Undertaking was reviewed by means of Council Regulation (EU) 2021/1173.[6]

Funding and objectives edit

The EuroHPC Joint Undertaking is jointly funded by its members with a budget of around 7 billion for the period 2021-2027.

Most of this funding comes from the current EU long-term budget, the Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF 2021-2027) with a contribution of 3 billion, distributed as follows:

  • 1,9 billion from the Digital Europe Programme (DEP) to support the acquisition, deployment, upgrading and operation of the infrastructures, the federation of supercomputing services, and the widening of HPC usage and skills;
  • 900 million from Horizon Europe (H-E) to support research and innovation activities for developing a world-class, competitive and innovative supercomputing ecosystem across Europe;
  • 200 million from Connecting Europe Facility (CEF-2) to improve the interconnection of HPC, quantum computing, and data resources, as well as the interconnection with the Union’s common European data spaces and secure cloud infrastructures.

The EU contribution is matched by a similar amount from the participating countries. Additionally, private members are contributing an amount of 900 million.[7]

The Joint Undertaking provides financial support in the form of procurement or research and innovation grants to participants following open and competitive calls.

The EuroHPC JU has the twin objectives of;

  • developing a pan-European supercomputing infrastructure: buying and deploying in the EU at least two supercomputers that will be among the top 5 in the world and at least two other that would today rank in the global top 25 for Europe's private and public users scientific and industrial users, for use in more than 800 scientific and industrial application fields;
  • supporting research and innovation activities: developing a European supercomputing ecosystem, stimulating a technology supply industry, and making supercomputing resources in many application areas available to a large number of public and private users, including small and medium-sized enterprises.[8][9]

Supercomputers edit

In June 2019, the EuroHPC JU governing board selected 8 sites for supercomputing centres located in 8 different EU Member States to host the new high-performance computing machines. The hosting sites will be located in Sofia (Bulgaria), Ostrava (Czech Republic), Kajaani (Finland), Bologna (Italy), Bissen (Luxembourg), Minho (Portugal), Maribor (Slovenia), and Barcelona (Spain). 3 of the 8 sites will host precursor to exascale machines (capable of executing more than 150 Petaflops, or 150 million billion calculations per second) that will be in the global top 5 supercomputers, and 5 petascale machines (capable of executing at least 4 Petaflops, or 4 million billion operations per second).[10][11][12]

In 2022, the EuroHPC governing board selected a further 5 sites to host a new fleet of EuroHPC supercomputers, including the first European exascale supercomputer to be located in Germany. [13]

KAROLINA edit

KAROLINA was installed in 2021 at IT4Innovations National Supercomputing Center in the Czech Republic. In the TOP500 list, which evaluates supercomputers in terms of their performance, it ranked 69th worldwide, 19th in Europe, and in the Green500 list of the most energy-efficient supercomputers, it even ranked 8th in 2021. The HPC system supplied by Hewlett Packard Enterprise is designed to respond coherently to the needs of its user communities, addressing complex scientific and industrial challenges, including standard numerical simulations, demanding data analysis, and artificial intelligence applications.[14]

Discoverer edit

"Discoverer", the EuroHPC supercomputer located in Bulgaria, was the third launched under the program on October 21, 2021. It is located on the territory of the Bulgarian Science and Technology Park "Sofia Tech Park" in Sofia, Bulgaria. The cost is co-financed by Bulgaria and EuroHPC JU with a joint investment of € 11.5 million completed by Atos. Discoverer has a stable performance of 4.5 petaflops and a peak performance of 6 petaflops.[15][16][17][18][19][20]

Vega edit

The Slovenian "Vega" was the first of the EuroHPC JU supercomputers to be launched on 20 April 2021. The system, built by Atos, is located at the Institute of Information Science Maribor (IZUM) in Maribor, Slovenia. The Vega supercomputer was jointly financed by EuroHPC JU and the Institute of Information Science Maribor (IZUM) to the sum of €17.2 million euros. Vega has a stable performance of 6.9 petaflops and a peak performance of 10.1 petaflops.[21][22]

MeluXina edit

"Meluxina", Luxembourg's supercomputer, was the second to be launched under the programme on 7 June 2021. Located at the LuxProvide data centre in Bissen, Luxembourg, the €30.4 million euros system was completed by Atos, with the Luxembourg government paying for two thirds of the associated costs, and the European Commission contributing the rest. Meluxina has a stable performance of 10 petaflops and a peak performance of 15 petaflops. The system is named after Melusine — a figure of Luxembourg and European folklore.[23][24][21][25]

LUMI edit

The LUMI supercomputer is located at CSC in Kajaani, Finland. The HPE Cray EX supercomputer was supplied by Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE),[26] with joint funding by EuroHPC and the LUMI Consortium.[27] As of mid-2022, the LUMI-C partition is operational, with the LUMI-G partition expected to become operational by the end of 2022. With a measured High Performance Linpack (HPL) performance of 151,9 petaflops, LUMI ranked 3rd on the June 2022 edition of the TOP500 list of the most powerful supercomputers.[28] Once fully operational, the system will have a theoretical peak performance of 550 petaflops. [29][30]

Leonardo edit

Located in the Technopole of Bologna, in Bologna, Italy, Leonardo is a pre-exascale supercomputer which was installed in 2022. It is supplied by ATOS, based on a BullSequana XH2000 supercomputer and hosted by CINECA. Once fully operational, it is expected to be capable of executing over 250 petaflops.[31]

MareNostrum5 edit

MareNostrum 5 will be located at the Barcelona Supercomputing Center in Barcelona, Spain. In 2022 it was announced that the system will be built by Atos. Once operational, MareNostrum 5 will be a top-of-the-range supercomputer, with an expected peak performance of 314 Petaflops. [32]

New supercomputers edit

In 2022, the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking announced a further five supercomputers coming soon to five European countries:

Members edit

The EuroHPC Joint Undertaking is composed of public and private members.

Public members edit

As of July 2022, public members of the Joint Undertaking include, the European Union (represented by the European Commission), 27 of the 27 EU Member States (Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain and Sweden), and six non-EU associated states of the EU's Horizon 2020 programme ( Israel, North Macedonia, Norway, Montenegro, Serbia, and Turkey).[33][34]

Other EU Member States or countries associated to Horizon 2020 are able to become members, provided that they accept the Statutes and financially contribute to the achievement of the objectives of the Joint Undertaking.[35]

Observer states edit

The United Kingdom lost its observer status following its departure from the EU on 31 January 2020.[36]

Private members edit

The Joint Undertaking's private members include the European Technology Platform for High Performance Computing (ETP4HPC), the European Quantum Industry Consortium (QuIC), and the Big Data Value (BDVA) associations. Any legal entity established in a Member State or country associated to Horizon 2020 that supports research and innovation may apply to become a private member of the Joint Undertaking.[35]

Governance edit

There are three bodies in the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking:

Governing board edit

The governing board is composed of representatives of the EU and participating states.[37] The European Commission and each participating state appoint one representative in the Governing Board.[37] Each representative may be accompanied by one expert.[37] The EU holds 50% of the voting rights through the European Commission representative.[37] The rest of the voting rights are distributed among the participating states according to the following lines;

  • for the general administrative tasks of the Joint Undertaking, the voting rights of the participating states should be distributed equally among them;
  • for the tasks corresponding to setting up the work plan for the acquisition of supercomputers, the selection of the hosting entity and the research and innovation activities of the Joint Undertaking, the voting rights of the participating states that are EU Member States are based on the principle of qualified majority. Participating states that are not EU Member States hold voting rights for the tasks corresponding to the research and innovation activities;
  • for the tasks corresponding to the acquisition and operation of supercomputers, only those participating states and the EU that contribute resources to the procurement of petascale supercomputers and the total cost of ownership of pre-exascale supercomputers have voting rights proportional to their contribution.[37]

Industrial and scientific advisory board edit

The industrial and scientific advisory board consists of two Groups which provide independent advice to the Governing Board;

  • the Research and Innovation Advisory Group (RIAG) identifies key research priorities. It is composed of no more than 12 members, where no more than six are appointed by the Private Members, and no more than six are appointed by the Governing Board;
  • the Infrastructure Advisory Group (INFRAG) provides advice on the acquisition and operation of the petascale and pre-exascale supercomputers. It is composed of no more than 12 members appointed by the Governing Board.[37]

Executive director edit

The executive director is the chief executive responsible for day-to-day management of the Joint Undertaking. The position is currently held by Anders Dam Jensen.[37]

Headquarters edit

The EuroHPC Joint Undertaking is headquartered in the Drosbach Building, used by the European Commission, in the Luxembourg City quarter of Gasperich, Luxembourg.[38]

See also edit

References edit

  1. ^ "European Council conclusions, 28 June 2016" (PDF). consilium.europa.eu. Archived (PDF) from the original on 29 August 2019. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
  2. ^ "The European declaration on High-Performance Computing". Digital Single Market – European Commission. 28 February 2018. Archived from the original on 5 June 2019. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
  3. ^ Simon, Frédéric (24 March 2017). "EU hails new Airbus-size alliance for supercomputers". euractiv.com. Archived from the original on 18 July 2019. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
  4. ^ a b c "Legislative train schedule – Connected digital single market European High Performance Computing Joint Undertaking / 2018–01". europarl.europa.eu. Archived from the original on 9 November 2019. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
  5. ^ European High Performance Computing Joint Undertaking Annual Activity Report 2020
  6. ^ "Council Regulation (EU) 2021/1173 of 13 July 2021 on establishing the European High Performance Computing Joint Undertaking and repealing Regulation (EU) 2018/1488". 13 July 2021.
  7. ^ EuroHPC Joint Undertaking. "Discover EuroHPC | Budget". EuroHPC Joint Undertaking. Retrieved 20 July 2022.
  8. ^ "European Commission – Press release – Council backs Commission's plans to invest €1 billion in world-class European supercomputers". europa.eu. 28 September 2018. Archived from the original on 30 May 2019. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
  9. ^ "EuroHPC Takes First Steps Towards Exascale". insideHPC. 15 February 2019. Archived from the original on 19 August 2019. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
  10. ^ "European Commission – Press release – Digital Single Market: Europe announces eight sites to host world-class supercomputers". europa.eu. 7 June 2019. Archived from the original on 8 June 2019. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
  11. ^ Brenton, Hannah (7 June 2019). "Luxembourg to host one of EU's first supercomputers". luxtimes.lu. Archived from the original on 8 June 2019. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
  12. ^ Brueckner, Rich (7 June 2019). "EU Funds Eight Pre-exascale Supercomputers". insideHPC. Archived from the original on 28 December 2021. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
  13. ^ Peckham, Oliver (15 June 2022). "EuroHPC Announces First Exascale Supercomputer and Four Other Systems". HPCwire. Retrieved 28 July 2022.
  14. ^ IT4Innovations. "KAROLINA". Retrieved 8 November 2023.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  15. ^ "Discoverer powers up: The Bulgarian EuroHPC supercomputer is inaugurated | European High Performance Computer Joint Undertaking". Archived from the original on 27 October 2021. Retrieved 25 October 2021.
  16. ^ "PetaSC: A new EuroHPC world-class supercomputer in Bulgaria | European High Performance Computer Joint Undertaking". Archived from the original on 18 October 2021. Retrieved 25 October 2021.
  17. ^ Добромир Видев. "Европейският суперкомпютър в България започва официално работа – От деня – БНР Новини". Bnr.bg. Archived from the original on 25 October 2021. Retrieved 28 December 2021.
  18. ^ Webcafe (21 October 2021). "Европейският суперкомпютър започна работа у нас". Webcafe.bg. Archived from the original on 25 October 2021. Retrieved 28 December 2021.
  19. ^ "Българският суперкомпютър Discoverer вече работи - Bgonair". Archived from the original on 25 October 2021. Retrieved 25 October 2021.
  20. ^ Антония Чорева (21 October 2021). "Представиха най-новия петскейл суперкомпютър Discover". News.bg. Archived from the original on 25 October 2021. Retrieved 28 December 2021.
  21. ^ a b "Discover EuroHPC JU | European High Performance Computer Joint Undertaking". eurohpc-ju.europa.eu. Archived from the original on 7 June 2021. Retrieved 13 July 2021.
  22. ^ SloTimes, Editor (21 April 2021). "Supercomputer Vega launched in Slovenia". Slovenia Times. Archived from the original on 1 May 2021. Retrieved 13 July 2021. {{cite web}}: |first= has generic name (help)
  23. ^ "Luxembourg launches Meluxina supercomputer". delano.lu. Archived from the original on 13 July 2021. Retrieved 13 July 2021.
  24. ^ "MeluXina is live: the EuroHPC JU supercomputer in Luxembourg is operational | European High Performance Computer Joint Undertaking". eurohpc-ju.europa.eu. Archived from the original on 7 June 2021. Retrieved 13 July 2021.
  25. ^ "MeluXina: a new EuroHPC world-class supercomputer in Luxembourg | European High Performance Computer Joint Undertaking". eurohpc-ju.europa.eu. Archived from the original on 7 June 2021. Retrieved 13 July 2021.
  26. ^ "Hewlett Packard Enterprise wins $160M+ contract to power one of the world's fastest supercomputers". Hewlett Packard Enterprise. 21 October 2020. Archived from the original on 19 July 2021. Retrieved 13 July 2021.
  27. ^ Ivarsson, Lars-Owe. "LUMI Supercomputer – Swedish National Infrastructure for Computing". www.snic.se. Archived from the original on 13 July 2021. Retrieved 13 July 2021.
  28. ^ "June 2022 | TOP500". www.top500.org. Retrieved 28 July 2022.
  29. ^ "LUMI: a new EuroHPC world-class supercomputer in Finland". EuroHPC Joint Undertaking. 21 October 2020. Archived from the original on 10 June 2021. Retrieved 13 July 2021.
  30. ^ "LUMI supercomputer". LUMI. Retrieved 28 July 2022.
  31. ^ "About | Leonardo Pre-exascale Supercomputer". Retrieved 28 July 2022.
  32. ^ "MareNostrum5: a new EuroHPC world-class supercomputer in Spain". BSC-CNS. Retrieved 28 July 2022.
  33. ^ "Governance". eurohpc-ju.europa.eu. Retrieved 28 July 2022.
  34. ^ "Documents". eurohpc-ju.europa.eu. Retrieved 28 July 2022.
  35. ^ a b "EuroHPC – Members". eurohpc-ju.europa.eu. Archived from the original on 1 May 2021. Retrieved 13 December 2020.
  36. ^ Emmen, Ad (14 February 2020). "The UK left EuroHPC". primeurmagazine.com. Archived from the original on 17 February 2020. Retrieved 17 February 2020.
  37. ^ a b c d e f g "EuroHPC – Governance". eurohpc-ju.europa.eu. Archived from the original on 26 October 2020. Retrieved 10 June 2019.
  38. ^ "EuroHPC – Contact us". eurohpc-ju.europa.eu. Archived from the original on 26 October 2020. Retrieved 13 December 2019.

External links edit