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The Minister for Research and Innovation, Seán Sherlock TD today (Thursday) announced new funding support of €8m to the Irish Centre for High-End Computing (ICHEC) which will support 25 top-class computational scientist positions over the next three years. The funding will also allow ICHEC to maintain truly cutting edge high performance computing equipment which will complement Ireland’s ambitions to be a global leader in Big Data/Data Analytics and High-Performance Computing.

ICHEC is hosted by the National University of Ireland Galway and the 25 staff are based in Galway and Dublin.

ICHEC provides computational and data analytical support for a range of research activities and services across Ireland’s higher education and industry sectors. For example, ICHEC works with partners such as Met Éireann, Tullow Oil and Paddy Power in areas that require expert computational staff to resolve complex business issues. It is also directly involved in European high performance computing activity through the EU supported PRACE programme.

Making the announcement Minister Sherlock said: “As part of the measures contained in the Action Plan for Jobs 2013, the Government has committed to making Ireland a leading country in Europe for Big Data, a sector currently growing at 40% per annum worldwide and in which Ireland has significant competitive advantages.

“We are all aware of the massive volume of data being created through the explosion of social media, increased usage of mobile devices and scientific advances in recent years. It seems that 90% of data that now exists has been created in just the last two years or so. This is phenomenal. Governments and industry globally are now presented with major challenges in the management and usefulness of this data – but this also presents significant commercial opportunities too.

“We believe that Ireland is in a prime position to lead in the area of Big Data/Data Analytics and High Performance Computing with many large multinationals already located here including Intel, Accenture, Google, Facebook, EMC and Data Direct Networks. However “Big Data” also needs the computational horsepower and talented personnel to be able to store, analyse and interpret the vast amount of data being generated.

“The ICHEC team of computational scientists and technologists, which is hosted by NUI Galway, goes some significant way to providing Ireland with this much needed “compute horsepower”, and talented personnel, who can make sense of the data. I am delighted to be able to announce this funding to ICHEC via the Higher Education Authority to sustain this much needed resource. As a direct consequence ICHEC should be able to help with the leveraging of new investments and the creation of quality jobs in Ireland,” Minister Sherlock concluded.

The funding announced by Minister Sherlock is being provided to NUI Galway by the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation and the Department of Education and Skills through the Higher Education Authority. It includes an investment of €3.7m awarded through Science Foundation Ireland’s Infrastructure Programme call in 2012.

Speaking at today’s announcement held in the Royal Irish Academy in Dublin, the Chairman of the Higher Education Authority, Mr. John Hennessy said “ICHEC provides a vital service to the higher education and research community through the provision of expert computational staff and high end computing technology to support scientific discovery. This funding will reinforce ICHEC as a national facility to provide a cost effective and efficient means of delivering HPC.”

Dr Jim Browne, President of NUI Galway, said: “NUI Galway is delighted to host this cutting-edge facility on our campus and welcomes the very significant level of investment announced by Minister Sherlock today. As a university engaged in international research in the field of ‘Big Data’, we understand well the role played by ICHEC in ensuring organisations maximise the potential of their data collection and analytics. ‘Big Data’ will transform so many aspects of our everyday lives from health care provision to financial services, and high performance computing is the engine that will power that transformation”.

Prof. JC Desplat, ICHEC Director, stated: “The ability to harness novel technologies such as Big Data, Data Analytics and High-Performance Computing will have a dramatic effect on Ireland’s competitiveness. ICHEC is committed to making the high-end expertise of its domain-experts available to industry, the public sector and academia. We anticipate that these partnerships will develop in areas as diverse as biomedical research, materials science, weather forecasting and geophysics.”

There was a significant industry presence at today’s event Mr Martin Curley, Vice President, Director, Intel Labs Europe, Intel Corp said “To outcompute is to outcompete. Ireland cannot be the world leader in the high performance in computing but Ireland can be a leader in the application of high performance computing – for example accurately predicting where and when the wind will blow so Ireland can optimally use the availability of renewable energy”.

Mr. Joe Mongan, Global Manager,Geophysical Technology Group, Tullow Oil commented “Tullow Oil welcomes today’s announcement. It further consolidates and enhances our existing advantage to have near-line access to ICHEC’s “state of the art” HPC facilities and its highly competent professional staff”.

Mr. Pascal Barbolosi, Vice President, EMEA Sales, DataDirect Networks said “DataDirect Networks (DDN) is delighted to be here today to see continued government investment into ICHEC’s important Big Data and Analytics work in research, education and industry. DDN storage is the backbone of more than two-thirds of the world’s top 100 supercomputers and nearly half of the top 500. This innovative technology is enabling organisations and governments to extract maximum value from their Big Data and Analytics, to accelerate workflows, gain valuable insight, shorten time to discovery and gain a competitive advantage. Therefore, it is important to see continued investment into Big Data and Analytics as this will create business growth and success.”

At the event today in the RIA, representatives from industry and academia presented their perspectives on High-Performance Computing and related technologies, with particular focus on economic impact and ICHEC's contributions to the Irish and European technological ecosystems.

Notes for Editors

About ICHEC – Irish Centre for High End Computing: www.ichec.ie

ICHEC is hosted by NUI Galway and the 25 staff are based in Galway and Dublin.

ICHEC was established in 2004/05 through Science Foundation Ireland (www.sfi.ie). Since its establishment it has received funding support via the Higher Education Authority (www.hea.ie) but has also leveraged considerable funding from non-Exchequer sources such as industry and the EU (primarily, through the PRACE programme - http://www.prace-ri.eu/).

ICHEC is a team of technology experts who enable effective computational solutions for academia, industry and the public sector through partnership, knowledge transfer and service provision. Their research enablement and technology leadership has been recognised internationally through awards such as the HPCwire Readers’ award for its “most innovative use of HPC in the Financial Services”.

Through ICHEC, Irish researchers have access to the most powerful computing resources in Europe with the necessary expert professional support to exploit them. In order to address the skill gaps in the ICT sector, ICHEC’s training and education programme delivers university-accredited courses, as well as on-demand training workshops. ICHEC’s outreach presentations (including the BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition) boost interest in science, technology, engineering and maths and encourage curiosity among the public. While facilitating major research around the country, ICHEC also undertakes commercial engagements across a broad spectrum including biomedical research, weather forecasting, geophysics and financial services. Among their list of partners are companies such as Tullow Oil, DataDirect Networks, MoneyMate and Amazon Web Services.

For more information see www.ichec.ie or contact the director of ICHEC, JC Desplat at j-c.desplat@ichec.ie

High-Performance Computing

Ireland is committed to establishing a world-class research environment characterised by world-class research outputs, populated by researchers of excellence working within a world-class research infrastructure. The provision of high-end computing resources for computational scientists is integral to the achievement of this overall vision.

Computational modelling now plays an increasingly important role in modern science and engineering – and is increasingly recognised as the third pillar of scientific inquiry following theory and experiment, and no country can expect to offer an innovative and competitive research environment without a strong and dynamic research base in computational modelling. The ability to perform internationally competitive research and to attract to Ireland the best computational scientists requires the ready availability of high-end computational (HEC, often also referred to as high-performance computing or HPC) resources.