An IBM supercomputer
 An IBM supercomputer. Source: Pixabay
AI opportunity for U.S. as Summit surpasses Asian supercomputer Robotics development: The U..S. has launched the world’s fastest supercomputer, called “Summit.” Developed by IBM and Nvidia, Summit has 200 petaflops of processing power (200,000 trillion calculations per second).
Summit surpassed China’s TaihuLight supercomputer, which had 93 petaflops of processing power.
Speaking about the AI opportunity at the Summit unveiling, the U.S. Secretary of Energy Rick Perry said, “We know we’re in a competition, and it matters who gets there first.”
Geopolitical significance: Supercomputers are fast becoming a measure of the computing power of a nation. While the U.S. may have the world’s fastest supercomputer, it no longer has the most supercomputers — 143 to China’s 202.
Other countries are also involved in this competition for processing prowess and the corresponding AI opportunity. In 2017, Japan was working on a 130-petaflops supercomputer. Before Summit, it would have been the fastest in the world.
Last year, Russia announced a new supercomputer that can process 55 trillion calculations a second. In 2018, India showed off the world’s fourth fastest supercomputer in the world for weather and climate research. By 2022, South Korea wants to have its own supercomputer, capable of 1 quadrillion calculations per second.
The big question for the countries deploying supercomputers and the companies building them is how the supercomputers will be used? Traditionally, supercomputers have been more about chest pumping than application. But now, countries are taking advantage of AI opportunity to apply them in different ways.
For example, in 2016, Russia unveiled a supercomputer to help predict wars. And later this year, Japan will launch a supercomputer solely to research nuclear fusion.
As nations deploy supercomputers to solve specific problems or research important areas, it may push other nations to buy or develop supercomputing technology. This creates a huge AI opportunity for businesses to supply supercomputing technology over the cloud.
For example, instead of building a supercomputer, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is using IBM Watson’s Cognitiv platform.
While the U.S. has regained its crown as having the world’s fastest supercomputer, it may not be for long. Word is that China is prepping a supercomputer, slated for 2020, that will measure in exaflops, not petaflops. It will be able to process one quintillion calculations per second, or 1 followed by 18 zeros (1,000 000 000 000 000 000).
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