In Lavrio Park the supercomputer “Daedalus” – Cooperation between EDYTE and NTUA

The Minister of State and Digital Governance, Kyriakos Pierrakakissigned on Friday morning a memorandum of long-term cooperation with National Technical University of Athens, represented by Rector Professor Andreas G. Boudouvis. The signing took place during the Minister’s visit to the Technological and Cultural Park of Lavrio, and specifically in the space that will host the new Supercomputer of the National Network of Technology and Research Infrastructures (EDYTE SA – GRNET) named DADALOS. The Deputy Minister of Finance, Theodoros Skylakakis, was also present during the signing.

After the signing of the memorandum and his tour of the Park, the Minister of State and Digital Government Kyriakos Pierrakakis stated: “The message of the installation of the new DAIDALOS Supercomputer in the historic area of ​​the Power Station of the French Mining Company of Lavrio is twofold. Greece was chosen by the European Commission to install a Supercomputer, and it is a recognition that our country in practice shows that it is innovating and positioning itself rapidly in the era of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. At the same time, she marries the old with the new, remembers and highlights her history, incorporates the lessons of the past into the foundations she lays for the future. I congratulate the management and the executives of EDYTE for their excellent work that contributes to Greece being considered a country that changes and pioneers, and I thank the Rector of NTUA. The installation of DAIDALOS in Lavrio, the first of a series of joint actions with the Foundation, will bring multiple benefits for the academic community, scientific knowledge, European cooperation and, of course, for the local community.».

The Deputy Minister of Finance, Theodoros Skylakakissaid: «With the installation of the “Daedalus” Supercomputer in Lavrio, the “door opens” to a new Greece, in which the fields of research, technology and innovation will play a decisive role for the faster development of our economy. One of the weaknesses we have in our research and innovation system is that we are more connected to the European private sector than to the Greek one. And this is something we have to overcome in the coming years. For this purpose, there are very important resources in the National Recovery and Sustainability Plan “Greece 2.0” for the cooperation of the Universities with the Greek private sector. There is no future without education, innovation and technology. Only if we invest in this “triptych” will we be able to really develop our economy in the 21st century».

The Rector of NTUA, Professor Andreas G. Boudouvissaid: «The National Technical University of Athens undertakes from the National Network of Technology and Research Infrastructures (EDYTE), a body supervised by the Ministry of Digital Government, to install, in the Technological and Cultural and Cultural Park of Lavrio, to manage and utilize the national system. which in terms of capabilities is at the forefront of international performance. It is an important project, primarily for the country, for the development and competitiveness that concerns the domestic complex ecosystem research-technology-innovation. The project, with a total budget of € 50 million, is funded by the European High Performance Computer Consortium (EuroHPC-JU) and the Recovery and Resilience Fund (RRF)».

The responsibility for the development and operation of the DAIDALOS supercomputer that will operate in 2024 lies with the National Network of Technology and Research Infrastructures (EDYTE SA – GRNET), a body of the Ministry of Digital Government, which since 2015 has developed and supports the existing supercomputer ARIS (Advanced Research Information System). Compared to ARIS, DADALOS will have 60 times more power. In particular, it will be a hybrid, featuring both high-density central processing units (CPUs) and graphics card accelerator units (GPUs), with an overall expected theoretical performance of 30 PFlops. This performance is expected to include the supercomputer DADALOS in the lists of the 500 top performance systems in the world (TOP500) and energy efficient (GREEN500).

The President of EDYTE, Professor of NTUA Stefanos Kollias stated: «EDYTE is proud to announce the creation of the new supercomputer. DADALOS, comes to cover the ever-increasing domestic, but also international, demand in computing power for projects of great complexity. It is known that the new technologies of the 4th Industrial Revolution, in particular the Technologies of Big Data Analytics, Artificial Intelligence, Engineering and Deep Learning require very large computing infrastructures and supercomputer power. EDYTE, supporting the National Strategy of the Ministry of Digital Governance regarding the development and use of the above technologies, will allocate the new supercomputer to support the production of new Knowledge from the Academic and Research Web of the country, while through special programs, will encourage of research results, but also access to supercomputer power, from the entire research and development ecosystem of the country, and in particular from Greek small and medium enterprises, in order to familiarize and use the above technologies and methodologies, but also their applications, from the entire productive fabric of the country».

The Chairman of the EDITE Advisory Committee and National Representative in the European Computing Joint Undertaking (EuroHPC Joint Undertaking) Professor NTUA Nectarios Kozyris stated: «EDYTE, as a national body of large-scale computing infrastructure, succeeded in the recent competitive invitation of the EU. to highlight the Greek proposal for medium-sized supercomputers (scale of several tens of Petaflops), second pan-European and to attract significant European funding that comes and complements the state investment through the Ministry of Digital Government and the Recovery Fund. The partnership with NTUA gives special dynamics, as the country’s universities and research centers have brought Greece to fifth place in competitive funding in Europe, for research in the field of supercomputers. In the context of EDYTE’s social responsibility for the protection of the environment, the power required will be produced from renewable energy sources with the aim of being one of the most efficient operating indicators in Europe. The development of the new system is part of the strategy of strengthening the country’s digital digital infrastructure through the recovery fund, as an action of the digital transformation book 2020-2025 of the Ministry of Digital Government».

The selection of Greece as one of the four European countries that will host the top mid-range high performance supercomputers (pre-exascale or petascale HPC) was recently announced by the European High Performance Computing Joint Undertaking Joint Undertaking Joint Undertaking Initiative EuroHPC JU) ». Specifically, the announcement concerns the development of the first European exascale supercomputer and the installation of four supercomputers in Europe, one of which is DADALOS, which will be installed in the building “Former Electric Station”, a recognized monument of modern industrial heritage, area 1.500. μ. in Lavrio. The EuroHPC JU Joint Undertaking enables the European Union and its participating countries to coordinate their efforts and share resources with a view to developing a world-class supercomputer infrastructure and a competitive innovation ecosystem in Europe. EDYTE, a facilitator of technological progress and modernization of the country’s infrastructure, participates in a number of pan-European HPC initiatives, mainly through the development and support of the existing supercomputer

A supercomputer is actually a system of hundreds or even thousands of computers that communicate with each other, solving problems at high speed, performing almost infinite and complex arithmetic operations per second, something that would be impossible to do from a simple computer. Today, supercomputers are a powerful tool for conducting research and contributing to solving some of humanity’s most important issues, such as the origin of the universe, the discovery of new drugs, climate change research, and more.

At the same time, part of the strategic planning of the infrastructures in the Technological and Cultural Park of Lavrio is the utilization of Artificial Intelligence and Data Analytics, in the context of the new generation of services developed by the Ministry of Digital Government. With the partnership of both EDYTE and the National Technical University of Athens, the development of a state-of-the-art technological unit is foreseen that will take advantage of the special features of the supercomputer to support large models of Machine Learning and Deep Learning.

As a result, particularly significant economic and social benefits are expected, overall upgrading the quality of life of the country’s citizens. Besides, the installation of DADALOS in the Technological and Cultural Park of Lavrio also contributes to the creation of a new technological node in the area. The park is expected to be accessible to the general public, and there is provision for the possibility of holding trainings, seminars and other events.

The design of the installation in Lavrio has been made based on environmental sustainability. DADALOS will be powered by renewable energy systems and will use modern cooling systems, so that there is a low energy cost. With the use of water from the sea, the power consumption for the use of air conditioning system is limited to a minimum. Finally, a photovoltaic park will be installed in the Technological and Cultural Park of Lavrio.

Greece, through EDYTE, strategically supports science and technology in the wider region of Southeastern Europe, coordinating a series of major electronic infrastructure projects over the last two decades. In this context, Cyprus, Northern Macedonia and Montenegro joined the operational consortium of the new DAIDALOS supercomputer, as members of the EuroHPC JU Joint Undertaking. These countries will join the user support team and receive similar hours of use in the supercomputer.

The cost of procurement of the supercomputer system DAIDALOS is budgeted at 33 million euros and will be covered up to 30% by the European Initiative of the Joint Undertaking EuroHPC JU, while 70% of the project will be implemented under the National Recovery and Sustainability Plan “Greece 2.0” with European Union funding – NextGenerationEU. The total cost of the investment along with the operation and reconstruction of the building is estimated to reach 50 million euros.

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