State of Supercomputers around the World

Introduction

I am working on a problem on my desktop using both CPU and GPU, but I know this problem also runs on supercomputers for larger and/or complex conditions. This made me wonder what the current state of supercomputers are and which countries have them. I made a simple analysis combining:

• TOP500 supercomputers list (November 2023)
• the countries where TOP500 supercomputers are located
• G20 countries, plus the permanent guest invitees Spain and Egypt
• top 30 countries in terms of nominal GDP (IMF, 2023 forecast)

It is not surprising that the supercomputers are mostly located in countries having the highest GDP. What I wanted to see is an overall picture and the outliers, the ones leading and the ones that are behind. The list of supercomputers are very fluid, it changes every year. Not sure yet but maybe I can keep this post up-to-date as new TOP500 list is released. Also, because I am in Europe, I give more information in this post regarding to the situation here in Europe.

The information about supercomputers in China, just by looking to TOP500 list, is not very correct. Although I prepared the main outline of this post based on TOP500 list, I give a little more information about the situation regarding China in its own section.

G20

G20 has the following countries as members. In addition to the member countries, European Union (EU) and African Union (AU) are also represented. Spain and Egypt are not members of G20 but they are permanent guest invitees and also included in the table below. The list is ordered by nominal GDP in trillion USD (IMF, 2023). The data is taken from G20 page in wikipedia.

Top 500 Supercomputers

Below is a table by country (and EU and AU) of TOP500 list, ordered by total Rmax (PFlops/s) which is the sum of the performance of all supercomputers in the corresponding country:

Before looking into the details, when compared to the G20 table before, it is easy to see Finland is a major outlier in this list, because its GDP is less than the countries in G20 but it has a very strong TOP500 presence.

European High Performance Computing Joint Undertaking (EuroHPC JU)

The reason for Finland being in the top of the table above is the European High Performance Computing Joint Undertaking (EuroHPC JU). Basically, EuroHPC JU, with its participating countries, create a “Supercomputing Ecosystem in Europe” and there are 8 (3 pre-exascale, 5 petascale) operational supercomputers under EuroHPC JU at the moment. The operational ones, in the order of their computational performance, are:

Deucalion is not yet in TOP500 list, hence Portugal is not listed in the previous table. Its performance figure (7.2 PFlops/s) is not from TOP500 data.

In addition to Finland, this also explains the relatively strong position of Italy and Spain, as well as the entries from Luxembourg, Czechia, Bulgaria and Slovenia.

In June 2022, EuroHPC JU announced five new sites for new supercomputers; Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland and Poland. The first to be operational later this year is in Germany, and it will be Europe’s first exascale supercomputer called JUPITER. The only other (known) exascale computer in the World is in US, called Frontier. It is not known for sure but it is believed that China also has an exascale supercomputer.

The other four planned supercomputers of EuroHPC JU are:

There are not much information regarding to these supercomputers yet, but it is mentioned they are mid-range (petascale and pre-exascale).

A small note is that EuroHPC JU is a joint effort not only of EU countries. In addition to EU countries the following are also participating.

• EFTA countries: Iceland and Norway
• EU Candidate countries with accession negotiations: Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia
• EU Candidate country with frozen negotiations: Turkey
• Israel

Thus, some supercomputers might also be co-funded with these non-EU countries (together with EU countries). Particularly:

• Iceland, Norway and Switzerland are part of LUMI consortium.
• Turkey is part of MareNostrum 5 consortium.

I do not know if this is a hard rule, but I saw it multiple times that says EU contributes 50% of the costs of pre-exascale supercomputers (such as MareNostrum 5) and 35% of the costs of petascale supercomputers. The remaining funds come from the country the supercomputer is going to be installed and also from other participating countries.

Analysis

Comparing the share of supercomputing resources (in TOP500 November 2023) vs. global GDP share (IMF, 2023 forecast), the countries (plus EU and AU) can be categorized into four groups based on the ratio between these two numbers (shares in supercomputing resources in TOP500 divided by global GDP share).

• Supercomputing leaders: countries having ratio more than 2x
• Supercomputer users: countries having ratio between 0.5x and 2x
• Supercomputer owners: countries having ratio less than 0.5x
• Supercomputer laggers: major countries (e.g. G20 member or in top 30 nominal GDP list) with no supercomputers

Below I analyse the situation in each country, either alone or together with the countries in similar situation (similar ratio etc.). The countries below are listed in the order of their ratio.

Supercomputing Leaders

Finland (19.02x)

Finland is a major outlier in TOP500 list. Its share of supercomputer resources is 5.5%, whereas its global GDP share is only 0.3%. This asymmetry is due to the presence of the EuroHPC JU pre-exascale supercomputer LUMI (>385 PFlop/s) in Finland.

In addition to LUMI, Finland has another entry in TOP500, called MAHTI (>5.3 PFlop/s).

Italy (2.39x)

Italy also ranks very high in TOP500, but the situation is slightly different than Finland (and Spain). Although Italy host the EuroHPC JU pre-exascale supercomputer Leonardo (>240 PFlop/s), this supercomputer only accounts for roughly 2/3 of supercomputer resources in Italy. The country also has multiple commercial (e.g. belonging to Eni S.p.A.) and national supercomputers.

Japan (2.35x)

If I want to exclude the skew in the data due to EuroHPC JU supercomputers in Finland, Italy and Luxembourg, Japan is one of two countries (other is United States) that actually has more than twice the supercomputing share than its global GDP share.

Luxembourg (2.14x)

Being also the location of EuroHPC JU office, Luxembourg hosts a EuroHPC JU supercomputer MeluXina (>12 PFlop/s). This is the only entry from Luxembourg in TOP500.

United States (2.05x)

United States, like Japan, has a ratio slightly more than 2. Moreover, since US has almost 26% of the global GDP, the country also host more than half (almost 53%) of all global supercomputer resources.

Supercomputer Users

Spain (1.74x)

Spain is ranked very high in TOP500 list because the EuroHPC JU pre-exascale supercomputer MareNostrum 5 (>178 PFlop/s) is in Spain. The situation is different than Italy, but more like Finland, because there are no other entries in TOP500 from Spain.

Slovenia (1.5x)

Similar to Luxembourg, Slovenia hosts the EuroHPC JU supercomputer Vega (>6.9 PFLop/s). It is the only entry from Slovenia.

EU (1.4x)

EU as a whole has more share in supercomputer resources (22%) compared to its global GDP share (16%), however it is still behind United States and Japan. The start of operation of first exascale supercomputer in Europe later this year might change this.

South Korea (1.32x), Saudi Arabia (1.26x), Sweden (1.18x) and Netherlands (1.18x)

Although located in different parts of the world, all of these four countries have very similar situation, having slightly above share in supercomputer resources than their global GDP share.

I should mention that Sweden and Netherlands have no EuroHPC JU supercomputers yet.

It might be interesting to see Saudi Arabia at this position. It is partially due to Saudi Aramco, because large energy companies usually need supercomputers, and Saudi Aramco has has 5 of 7 supercomputers in Saudi Arabia. However, the most powerful supercomputer in Saudi Arabia, called Shaheen III (> 35.6 PFlop/s), is located in a university.

Bulgaria (1.02x)

Bulgaria also hosts a EuroHPC JU supercomputer Discoverer (>4.5 PFlop/s).

In addition to Discoverer, Bulgaria also has another entry in TOP500 called HEMUS (>2.5 PFlops/).

Germany (0.86x) and France (0.84x)

Germany and France are almost the same, having slightly less share in supercomputing resources (3.6% and 2.4%) than their global GDP share (4.2% and 2.9%)

After the start of operation of Europe’s first exascale supercomputer in Germany later this year, the situation will probably radically change.

Taiwan (0.62x) and Russia (0.59x)

Taiwan and Russia have similar ratios. I am not sure how the war in Ukraine has affected the Russia’s position in TOP500. I guess it will be more clear in forthcoming years.

Supercomputer Owners

Switzerland (0.44x) and Norway (0.43x)

Neither Switzerland nor Norway are EU countries, but they are part of EFTA. Switzerland has slightly more than 1.5x of supercomputer resources than Norway but compared to global GDP share (%), they have the same ratio (~0.43).

Switzerland has 3 entries in TOP500, but the majority (>80%) of computing power comes from a single supercomputer (Piz Daint, 21.23 PFlop/s).

Norway has five entries in TOP500, one non-commercial, four commercial supercomputers. These all have similar performance (4.72 PFlop/s to 2.35 PFlop/s).

Czechia (0.42x)

Similar to Slovenia, Czechia’s only supercomputer Karolina (6.75 + 2.84 PFlop/s) is part of EuroHPC JU.

Australia (0.40x), Brazil (0.39x), United Kingdom (0.36x)

Australia, Brazil and UK have very similar positions in terms of their shares in supercomputers vs. their share in global GDP.

I wondered if there is a particular reason for Brasil’s position in TOP500 and actually it seems there is one. Brazil has 9 entries in TOP500 and 6 of these (and first 5 of 9) belong to Petroleo Brasileiro S.A. It seems that countries with large energy companies might have important supercomputing resources.

I think it is fair to say it is surprising to see UK behind Japan, US, Germany and France.

China (0.34x)

It is quite hard to say anything about China’s position just by looking to TOP500. The last new supercomputer submission from China was Sunway TaihuLight in 2016. It is not hard to guess there has to be new supercomputers installed in China since 2016.

There are some reports that in 2021, China already had two exascale (one >1 EFlop/s, other >1.3 EFlop/s) computers and a third one was already planned for 2022.

At the moment, the supercomputers in China in TOP500 list has 407 PFlop/s. It would not be a bad estimate to say the real number is probably over 2000 PFlop/s. This would put China close to EU, United States and Japan in my categorization.

Morocco (0.32x)

To my surprise, Morocco is in TOP500 list, as the country has the only supercomputer in Africa (and hence in African Union/AU), called Toubkal (>3.1 PFlops). It is operational since 2021.

Canada (0.29x), Singapore (0.27x), Poland (0.24x), Thailand (0.24x), Hungary (0.23x)

All these countries have similar ratios. They all have either national or national and commercial supercomputer installations.

There are already plans for two EuroHPC JU supercomputers, one in Poland and the other in Hungary. When these become operational, Poland and Hungary will definitely move up in my categorization.

Ireland (0.29x) and United Arab Emirates (0.21x)

Ireland and UAE also have a similar ratio to the countries mentioned just before (Canada…). The difference is that the entries from Ireland and UAE to the TOP500 list only comes from commercial installations, so I assume there are no national supercomputers.

I have read that because the existing HPC platform in Ireland reached its service life and the new EuroHPC JU supercomputer CASPIr to be installed in Ireland is delayed, an interim solution is developed to use the MeluXina supercomputer in Luxembourg. (Source: Introducing the Interim National HPC Service). When CASPIr become operational, it will definitely move Ireland up in my categorization.

Austria (0.14x), Argentina (0.09x), India (0.08x) and Belgium (0.06x)

Argentina and Belgium each has one supercomputer and they are not very different in computational power (3.9 and 2.7 PFlop/s).

Austria has two supercomputers, both has similar computational power (2.3 and 2.7 PFlop/s).

India has four supercomputers and they are considerably more powerful (19.5 PFlop/s in total). However, because India has a considerably more share (3.57%) in global GDP than Austria, Argentina and Belgium (0.5%, 0.6% and 0.5%), its ratio is similar to these countries.

AU (0.05x)

African Union is the last in the list because only Morocco has a supercomputer at the moment. However, this is going to change in a few years (2027?) as there is currently a plan to install a quite large supercomputer (>135 PFlop/s) in South Africa. If this would happen now, it would put AU ahead of EU in terms of my categorization.

Supercomputer Laggers

The countries below have no supercomputers at the moment.

Mexico and Indonesia

Neither Mexico nor Indonesia have a supercomputer. Mexico had an entry in TOP500 before, but it has none at the moment.

Turkey

Turkey does not have an operational supercomputer at the moment. However, participating in MareNostrum 5, Turkey has access to this supercomputer. Also, there is an ongoing project to install a national supercomputer, which is planned to be operational in 2024. Unfortunately, I cannot find any information regarding the computational power of this supercomputer, it is only mentioned that it has 56448 cores. Looking at the current TOP500 list, I can only say it might have around 5 PFlop/s. With a supercomputer around 5 PFlop/s, Turkey would still have a ratio of 0.06. For my categorization, to be close to UK or Switzerland, Turkey would need a supercomputer with a computational power in 25-35 PFlop/s range.

Israel

Israel does not have an operational supercomputer at the moment, however the first phase of its first supercomputer called Israel-1 was completed in late 2023. This computer will have 130 PFlop/s computational power. As Israel’s share in global GDP is not too high (0.5%), a 130 PFlop/s supercomputer would mean a ratio of 3.7x which would put Israel higher than Japan in my categorization.

Egypt and South Africa

Neither countries have a supercomputer but South Africa is planning to install a major supercomputer to be operational probably in 2027.