A Note from Chief Executive, Dr Terence Hung

As 2024 draws to a close, it’s an opportune time to reflect on a remarkable year for the National Supercomputing Centre (NSCC) Singapore. It has been an exciting year of challenges but also opportunities for NSCC Singapore as we focus on our role as a national high performance computing (HPC) infrastructure. 

This year, we achieved significant milestones that highlight the strength and dedication of our team and Singapore’s HPC community. 

Together with our HPC community partners, we initiated a restructure of the NSCC Singapore’s allocation policies to better streamline, optimise and maximise Singapore’s precious national HPC resource. This is to ensure that these resources are best deployed and utilised to support national programmes and research projects that have the potential to create impact for Singapore’s society and economy. 

We announced our initiatives at NSCC Singapore’s inaugural HPC Users Symposium, a new event that will tighten our engagement with our users and collaborators and promote a more vibrant Singapore HPC community. We also co-organised and participated in international events like the SupercomputingAsia 2024 in Sydney, ISC24 in Hamburg and SC24 in Atlanta, where we cemented our partnerships as we continue to leverage the experience and best practices of well-established HPC centres and partners abroad. 

Through the hard work of the NSCC Singapore team, we were able to procure, test and commission Singapore’s current national supercomputing systems. We launched both the ASPIRE 2A and ASPIRE 2A+ supercomputers with the latter designed to be a quick and much needed addition to meet the rising demand for Singapore’s growing AI-centric thrusts. In recognition of NSCC Singapore’s role as a critical national infrastructure, the National Research Foundation, Singapore (NRF) announced a S$270 million grant to further enhance the nation’s HPC infrastructure beyond our current systems, build HPC capabilities and research, and promote and develop HPC talent. Furthermore, we signed an MoU with Quantinuum to foster quantum computing collaborations, develop hybrid solutions, and drive innovations in areas such as computational biology, in alignment with Singapore’s National Quantum Strategy.

These successes would not have been possible without the dedication of the NSCC Singapore team and support from our key local partners such as the National Research Foundation (NRF), by the Agency of Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR), the National University of Singapore (NUS), the Nanyang Technological University (NTU), the National Environmental Agency (NEA) and many, many more. The insights and cooperation provided by global HPC peers through efforts like the Alliance of Supercomputing Centres (ASC) members continue to play a key role in fostering collaborations and sharing expertise that help strengthen our efforts to drive local advancements in AI, healthcare, climate science, and material science.

Looking ahead to 2025, we are excited to build on this momentum and seize new opportunities for collaboration and growth. On behalf of NSCC Singapore, thank you for your continued support. Wishing you a joyous holiday season and a Happy New Year!