Brussels, 15/02/2012 (Agence Europe) - As part of the Digital Agenda's priorities to provide Europe with the necessary ICT infrastructure to support innovation, the European Commission put forward a plan on 15 February for the EU to reverse its relative decline in High Performance Computing (HPC) use and capabilities. The EU will double its investment in HPC (from €630 million to €1.2 billion) and become home to computers that can perform 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 (i.e. 1018) operations per second (“exa-scale”), before 2020. European Digital Agenda Commissioner Neelie Kroes said: “High Performance Computing is a crucial enabler for European industry and for more jobs in Europe. It's investments like HPC that deliver innovations improving daily life. We've got to invest smartly in this field because we cannot afford to leave it to our competitors”.
High Performance Computing (HPC) is critical for industries that rely on precision and speed, such as the automotive and aviation industries, and the health sector. Access to rapid simulations carried out by ever-improving super computers can be the difference between life and death and help make companies profitable. 97 % of the industrial companies that employ HPC consider it indispensable for their ability to innovate, compete and survive. The Commission plan will develop HPC in Europe by: 1) strengthening PRACE as the leading pan-European HPC e-infrastructure, pooling national and EU funds to service academic and industrial research; 2) creating a workforce adequately trained in HPC; 3) stimulating the market for HPC in Europe by supporting more acquisitions of HPC systems and services and faster uptake of HPC by industry and SMEs; 4) encouraging member states to jointly procure leading edge HPC systems in order to share costs; 5) establishing centres of excellence for software in scientific fields like energy, life-sciences and climate; 6) supporting the HPC Industry and research to maintain an independent and state-of-the-art EU supply chain through research and Innovation funding and pre-commercial procurement; 7) working to ensure that the EU HPC industry has fair access to global markets. (IL/transl.fl)