Supercomputer VSC-5: Top ranking even before completion

The "Vienna Scientific Cluster 5", a joint project of several universities, joins the group of the fastest supercomputers worldwide even before its completion.

With the "Vienna Scientific Cluster 5" (VSC-5), Austrian science will soon have the next world-class high-performance computing expansion stage at its disposal. In the current Top500 ranking of supercomputers, the VSC-5 lands at 301st place – even though it is currently still in the installation phase. The current configuration achieves a benchmark value of 2.31 petaflops. Its real performance remains to be seen, although it certainly opens up new possibilities for science.

The project is financed by the Federal Ministry of Education, Science and Research as part of the performance agreements with the universities. Science Minister Martin Polaschek is therefore very pleased with this successful debut of the new national high-performance computer: "For the Ministry of Science, the most modern and thus competitive research infrastructure is a central building block for Austria's success in science and research. I am very pleased with the first strong sign of life of the new machine and I thank all the universities involved as well as the hardware suppliers. In challenging times for hardware procurement, the computing capacities were expanded with the utmost commitment and the first benchmark also impressively demonstrated the success of the project."

The Vienna Scientific Cluster is a joint project of Austrian universities – TU Wien, University of Vienna, TU Graz, University of Innsbruck, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences Vienna and Johannes Kepler University Linz. The company MEGWARE is responsible for the implementation of the VSC-5.

More details on the productive system and the final performance will follow with the opening of the VSC-5.