AMSTERDAM, Feb. 8, 2021 — Leno­vo Data Cen­ter Group (DCG) announ­ced it will deli­ver high-per­for­mance com­pu­ter (HPC) infra­struc­tu­re for SURF, the ICT coope­ra­ti­ve for edu­ca­ti­on and rese­arch in the Net­her­lands. The €20 mil­li­on pro­ject, which beg­ins in ear­ly 2021, will result in the crea­ti­on of the lar­gest and most powerful super­com­pu­ter in the country.

 

Powe­ring inno­va­ti­on along­side key partners 

Leno­vo sta­te-of-the-art HPC tech­no­lo­gy will include Leno­vo Think­Sys­tem ser­vers, powered by 2nd Gen AMD EPYC pro­ces­sors and Think­Sys­tem ser­vers powered by future gene­ra­ti­on AMD EPYC pro­ces­sors, and all being coo­led by Leno­vo Nep­tu­ne water coo­ling tech­no­lo­gy. 12,4 Pebi­by­te (PiB) of Leno­vo Dis­tri­bu­ted Sto­rage Solu­ti­on (DSS‑G) and ser­vers with NVIDIA HGX A100 4‑GPU will also assist with the arti­fi­ci­al intel­li­gence and machi­ne lear­ning abili­ties requi­red for SURF’s inno­va­ti­ve rese­arch. NVIDIA Mel­lan­ox HDR 200Gb/s Infi­ni­Band, with smart in-net­work com­pu­ting acce­le­ra­ti­on engi­nes, pro­vi­de the extre­me­ly low laten­cy, high data through­put net­wor­king. Run­ning at ten-times the capa­ci­ty of the pre­vious sys­tem and achie­ving an over­all peak per­for­mance of almost 13 PFLOPs, Lenovo’s smar­ter infra­struc­tu­re will deli­ver a powerful, high­ly effi­ci­ent and sus­tainable tool for sci­en­tists and rese­ar­chers in the future.

“AMD is proud to be working with lea­ding glo­bal insti­tu­ti­ons to pro­vi­de access to advan­ced tech­no­lo­gies and capa­bi­li­ties that are cri­ti­cal for sup­port­ing modern HPC workloads and rese­arch that addres­ses some of the world’s grea­test chal­lenges,” said Roger Ben­son, seni­or direc­tor, Com­mer­cial EMEA at AMD. “We are thril­led to be col­la­bo­ra­ting with Leno­vo Data Cen­ter Group on such an inno­va­ti­ve HPC pro­ject, brin­ging the per­for­mance of AMD EPYC pro­ces­sors to sci­en­tists and rese­arch insti­tu­ti­ons in The Net­her­lands, allo­wing them to excel in their work.”

Ener­gy effi­ci­en­cy through water-coo­ling technology

While opti­mal per­for­mance is a neces­si­ty for the SURF Dutch Natio­nal Super­com­pu­ter, it is also vital­ly important to ensu­re the sys­tem is ener­gy effi­ci­ent. Lenovo’s water-coo­ling tech­no­lo­gy will remo­ve appro­xi­m­ate­ly 90% of the heat from the sys­tem, redu­cing over­all ener­gy con­sump­ti­on, signi­fi­cant­ly incre­asing over­all effi­ci­en­cy and ulti­m­ate­ly allo­wing the pro­ces­sors to per­form at their peak.

Tina Borgbjerg, Gene­ral Mana­ger for Bene­lux and Nor­dics, Leno­vo DCG, says, “We’re so plea­sed to con­tri­bu­te to a pro­ject that will not only enrich sci­en­ti­fic rese­arch in the Net­her­lands but deli­ver a smar­ter and more ener­gy-effi­ci­ent sys­tem, thanks to our incre­di­ble water-coo­ling tech­no­lo­gy. The sheer power that will be deli­ver­ed by this natio­nal super­com­pu­ter show­ca­ses our strength in HPC, and the sca­le of this deal fur­ther demons­tra­tes our com­mit­ment to the Bene­lux regi­on and the Netherlands.”

“Our A100 Ten­sor Core GPUs fea­tured in SURF are based on NVIDIA Ampere archi­tec­tu­re, an engi­nee­ring mile­stone that boosts per­for­mance for Arti­fi­ci­al Intel­li­gence (AI) trai­ning and infe­rence, as well as easi­ly mee­ting the access and power demands of the modern AI and HPC workloads,” said Ian Buck, Gene­ral Mana­ger and Vice Pre­si­dent of Acce­le­ra­ted Com­pu­ting at NVIDIA. “Incor­po­ra­ting the world’s most advan­ced AI tech­no­lo­gy, all con­nec­ted by high-band­width, low-laten­cy NVIDIA Mel­lan­ox HDR Infi­ni­Band net­wor­king, into the SURF super­com­pu­ter gives rese­ar­chers what they need to quick­ly and effec­tively take on the workloads of the exas­ca­le AI era.”

The moder­niza­ti­on of the infra­struc­tu­re will begin in Febru­ary 2021 and pha­se 1 of the new super­com­pu­ter is expec­ted to be ope­ra­tio­nal by mid-2021.

About Leno­vo 

Leno­vo (HKSE: 992) (ADR: LNVGY) is a US$50 bil­li­on For­tu­ne Glo­bal 500 com­pa­ny, with 63,000 employees and ope­ra­ting in 180 mar­kets around the world.  Focu­sed on a bold visi­on to deli­ver smar­ter tech­no­lo­gy for all, we are deve­lo­ping world-chan­ging tech­no­lo­gies that crea­te a more inclu­si­ve, trust­wor­t­hy and sus­tainable digi­tal socie­ty. By desig­ning, engi­nee­ring and buil­ding a com­ple­te port­fo­lio of smart devices and infra­struc­tu­re, we are also lea­ding an Intel­li­gent Trans­for­ma­ti­on – to crea­te bet­ter expe­ri­en­ces and oppor­tu­ni­ties for mil­li­ons of cus­to­mers around the world. To find out more visit https://www.lenovo.com.

About SURF

SURF is the col­la­bo­ra­ti­ve orga­niza­ti­on for ICT in Dutch edu­ca­ti­on and rese­arch. Within the SURF coope­ra­ti­ve, uni­ver­si­ties, uni­ver­si­ties of appli­ed sci­en­ces, voca­tio­nal schools, rese­arch insti­tu­ti­ons and uni­ver­si­ty medi­cal cen­ters work tog­e­ther on ICT faci­li­ties and ICT inno­va­tions. This pro­vi­des stu­dents, lec­tu­r­ers, rese­ar­chers and staff with the best ICT faci­li­ties for top rese­arch and talent deve­lo­p­ment under favorable con­di­ti­ons. For more infor­ma­ti­on, visit https://www.surf.nl/en.