Supercomputing in the future

Given the current speed of progress, supercomputers are projected to reach 1 exaflops (10¹⁸) (one quintillion FLOPS) in 2019. Futurist Ray Kurzweil expects supercomputers capable of human brain neural simulations, for which, according to Kurzweil, 10 exaflops (10¹⁹) would be required in 2025.

The nature of access to high performance computing is undergoing a change. Through cloud computing, users such as small start-up companies can subscribe to resources for a finite period of time, without the requirements of owning large systems. The C4 is currently in the process of establishing a research test bed for cloud computing, in collaboration with a consortium comprising Yahoo, Intel and HP Labs.