Monthly Archives: June 2023

This was one of the outcomes of the half-day workshop of the National Competence Centres in HPC (NCC), which was held on 12th June and immediately preceded the 9th annual Austrian-Slovenian HPC Meeting.

What else was discussed at the meeting, including representatives from the Czech Republic? The discussion on key topics such as deepening cooperation with small and medium-sized enterprises and creating and effectively presenting a portfolio of services was supported by model presentations of success stories examples. These confirmed, among other things, the need for mutual synergy of individual NCCs as well as the importance of their cooperation within other projects (e.g., European Digital Innovation Hubs) and cooperation with industrial companies.

The 9th Austrian-Slovenian HPC Meeting (ASHPC 2023) was held in Maribor, Slovenia, on 13–15 June. The programme also included a presentation titled “NCC Czech Republic, Entrance to the World of HPC” by Tomáš Karásek, the Czech NCC Coordinator.

The three-day event brought several exciting contributions. National institutions and scientific clusters presented their latest work, and news from the world of exascale and cloud computing was also discussed. Subsequently resonating in the discussions, one central topic was quantum computing, its potential, development, and integration into the high-performance computing environment. The conference also featured a poster session.

The ASHPC Meeting traces its roots back to 2015. The original modest event focused exclusively on HPC issues in Austria, with an overlap to the German-speaking countries, has grown over time, and the last three editions are now fully dedicated to current topics in the Central European region and the Balkan countries. For a change, the Jubilee 10th edition will be held in Austria next year.

The most significant science popularisation event in the Czech Republic, the Science Fair, has already passed. This year’s seventh edition, traditionally held at the PVO EXPO Praha exhibition centre in Letňany in Prague (8th – 10th June), broke not only records in the number of visitors. Indeed, we couldn’t miss out on it.

Throughout the event, there was great interest in visiting our booth, Unlock the Secrets of Supercomputers. What is a supercomputer? What does it consist of? What can be calculated on it? What is its main advantage? These are just some of the visitors’ inquisitive questions during the three days. They also took part in a virtual reality experience, in which they moved to our data room, and many had a spin on the wheel of fortune, where knowledge and attention also played an important role. Finally, an easy supercomputer quiz with Harry Potter was a huge success among the children.

So, what was the deal with the records? The first one was broken at the very beginning of the event, with 100 exhibitors registering. Another record was broken when the organisers counted 46,000 visitors, 11,000 more than last year. This year’s Science Fair was indeed worth it!

The Science Fair is the most significant science popularisation and educational event in the Czech Republic, organised by the Czech Academy of Sciences since 2015. This year it was held for the seventh time (two editions were cancelled due to the Covid pandemic)

Europe’s most important event in high-performance computing, ISC 2023, is already over. The National Competence Centre in HPC (NCC) presented its achievements so far, including successful collaborations with companies and other stakeholders in the field, and introduced the conference participants to current opportunities for collaboration with industry, public administration, and academia.