On Wednesday, the UK government announced a significant investment of £225 million (approximately $273 million) in an artificial intelligence supercomputer, demonstrating the country’s commitment to leading in AI technology and narrowing the gap with global tech leaders like the United States and China.
The University of Bristol has been tasked with the development of this state-of-the-art supercomputer, which has been aptly named Isambard-AI in honor of the renowned 19th-century British engineer Isambard Brunel. This announcement coincided with the commencement of the UK’s AI safety summit, held at the historic Bletchley Park.
The Isambard-AI is poised to become the most advanced computer in the UK. Once completed, it is expected to outperform the country’s current fastest supercomputer by a remarkable factor of 10. To achieve this incredible performance, Isambard-AI will be equipped with 5,448 GH200 Grace Hopper Superchips, powerful AI chips manufactured by the leading U.S. semiconductor giant Nvidia, which specializes in high-performance computing applications.
The American IT giant Hewlett Packard Enterprise is collaborating in the development of this supercomputer. There are also plans to eventually integrate it with a newly announced Cambridge supercomputer known as Dawn. This separate project, built in collaboration with Dell and the UK-based firm StackPC, will be powered by over 1,000 Intel chips that use advanced water-cooling technology to reduce power consumption. Dawn is expected to commence operations within the next two months.
The UK government has high hopes for these two supercomputers, with aspirations to achieve groundbreaking advancements in areas such as fusion energy, healthcare, and climate modeling.
Both supercomputers are scheduled to be operational by the summer of 2024. They will be pivotal in facilitating advanced AI model analysis, testing safety features, and driving innovations in fields like drug discovery and clean energy.
It’s worth noting that the UK government had previously allocated £1 billion to invest in the semiconductor industry to secure the country’s chip supplies and reduce its reliance on East Asia for critical microchips.
