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Hewlett Packard Enterprise announced it has been awarded SG$40 million to build a new supercomputer for the National Supercomputing Centre (NSCC) Singapore, the national high-performance computing (HPC) resource centre dedicated to supporting science and engineering computing needs for academic, research and industry communities. The new system, which will be 8X faster compared to NSCC’s existing pool of HPC resources, will expand and augment ongoing research efforts by enabling tools such as artificial intelligence (AI) and deep machine learning to optimize modelling, simulation and even software simulation for quantum computing. NSCC will use the system to unlock scientific discoveries across medicine, diseases, climate, engineering and more.

The new supercomputer was funded through a SG$200 million investment that was announced by the Singapore government in March 2019 to boost Singapore’s high-performance computing resources.

Fueling a new supercomputing journey at the National Supercomputing Centre Singapore

The NSCC’s new supercomputer will be built and powered using the HPE Cray EX supercomputer, which is an HPC system designed to support next-generation supercomputing, such as Exascale-class systems, that also features a full stack of purpose-built technologies across compute, software, storage and networking to harness insights from vast, complex data more quickly and efficiently. The advanced performance will help tackle compute and data-intensive modelling and simulation needs requiring higher speed and targeted HPC and artificial intelligence capabilities.

The new system will be housed in a new data centre designed to increase sustainability and reduce energy consumption. To further support NSCC’s mission for a greener data centre, the new system will leverage liquid-cooling capabilities made possible through the HPE Cray EX supercomputer to increase energy efficiency and power density by transferring heat generated by the new supercomputer with a liquid-cooled process.

The combination of these advanced technologies will enable the NSCC’s existing community of researchers and scientists to further their R&D efforts to make breakthroughs in a range of areas, some of which include:

• Understanding the spread of airborne cough droplets which is critical to addressing immediate risks related to the COVID-19 pandemic
• Accelerating insights into weather forecasting and climate patterns for Singapore and Southeast Asia with high-resolution weather modelling capabilities
• Advancing safety in autonomous driving with optimised AI training

“We are inspired by how Singapore’s community of scientists have leveraged high-performance computing to improve ongoing research efforts. We are honoured to continue empowering their mission by building them a powerful system using the HPE Cray EX supercomputer that delivers comprehensive, purposely-engineered technologies for demanding research,” said Bill Mannel, vice president and general manager, HPE. “The new system will deliver a significant boost to R&D, allowing Singapore’s community of scientists and engineers to make greater contributions that will unlock innovation, economic value, and overall, strengthen the nation’s position in becoming more digitally-driven.”

“Supercomputers have enabled the scientific community in Singapore to make significant strides in their research,” said Associate Professor Tan Tin Wee, Chief Executive at the National Supercomputing Centre (NSCC) Singapore. “The new system will provide the necessary resources to meet the growing supercomputing needs of our researchers, and to enable more of such significant scientific breakthroughs at the national and global level.”

The NSCC’s supercomputer unlocks new level of scientific discovery with advanced technologies

The HPE Cray EX supercomputer powering NSCC’s new supercomputer is a purpose-built system designed specifically to deliver petaflop to exaflop performance with the world’s most energy-efficient footprint. It also includes the HPE Cray EX software stack for software-defined capabilities that allow the NSCC’s users to gain the high-performance of a supercomputer, but through the operational experience of a cloud. Additionally, HPE will integrate the following next-generation technologies with the HPE Cray EX supercomputer:

• Expanded storage to support and share complex workloads in modelling, simulation and AI using the Cray ClusterStor E1000 storage system from HPE and HPE Data Management Framework. NSCC’s new supercomputer will deliver 10 petabytes of storage with over 300GB/s of read/write performance speeds.
• Purpose-built HPC networking using HPE Slingshot to address demands for higher speed and congestion control for data-intensive workloads
• Fully integrated software suite to optimise HPC and AI applications using the HPE Cray Programming Environment
• Powerful compute to improve modelling and simulation using 3^rd Gen AMD EPYC processors
• Targeted accelerated computing capabilities with 352 NVIDIA A100 Tensor Core GPUs for HPC and AI workloads
• Expanded network infrastructure with multiple 100Gbps links for upgraded connectivity between users and the supercomputing resources using the SingAREN-Lightwave Internet Exchange (SLIX) from the Singapore Advanced Research and Education Network (SingAREN)

The new system will be operational in early 2022.

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