This model was used in SRA 1-2-3 and it also forms the basis of the Working Groups applied in SRA 4.

ETP4HPC believes in the balanced development of the entire European HPC ecosystem. There is a need to develop technologies that both facilitate the delivery of high-end systems and also aid the use of HPC by a variety of users.

There is a demand for R&D and innovation in both extreme performance systems and mid-range HPC systems. Almost all scientific domains and some industrial users want to achieve extreme scale performance systems as soon as possible. At the same time, there is a particular need expressed by industrial users and ISVs for more flexible, easy-to-use, more productive and more cost-effective HPC systems delivering mid-range performance.

The ETP4HPC HPC technology providers are also convinced that in order to build a sustainable ecosystem, their R&D investments should target the exascale objective, whilst deriving from these technology innovations, and, in turn, will serve the wider market needs. This strategy will yield a sufficient return on investment and support sustainable technology development. Developing technologies capable of serving both the extreme scale requirements and wider market needs, whilst being successful in strengthening Europe’s position.

THE ETP4HPC STRATEGY HAS TWO DIMENSIONS:

• Targeting the R&D aiming at developing the new technologies which are able to offer more competitive and innovative HPC systems for a broad HPC market
• Enhancing these technologies with the right characteristics to address the extreme scale requirements.

 As the third element, there is the trend for developing new HPC applications. Besides traditional HPC workloads, more and more big data applications will need to be addressed with HPC solutions. The Cloud delivery model will play a prominent role in the provision of HPC-based services. Accordingly, the SRA has a dimension to address all these new use patterns. 

Some stakeholders are concerned that HPC development could be limited by some barriers, namely, shortage of skills, insufficient availability of services to fill the gap between potential user demands and HPC solution offerings, usability of solutions or flexibility and vitality of the ecosystem.

ETP4HPC FOCUSES ON FOUR MAIN DIMENSIONS:

• The creation of new technologies within the entire HPC stack (HPC Stack Elements)
• The improvement of system characteristics (Extreme Scale Requirements)
• New deployment fields for HPC (New HPC Deployments)
• The expansion of the use of HPC (HPC Usage Expansion)

The details of our model are depicted in the picture below. It contains the areas that we focus on in our roadmap for HPC technology development in Europe - the Strategic Research Agenda (SRA).