Artificial Intelligence and High-Performance Computing: The University of Montpellier Announces the Launch of a New Computing and Cloud Cluster as Part of the 2021–2027 CPER
At the start of 2024, Philippe Augé, President of the University of Montpellier, announced the upcoming launch of a new computing and cloud cluster, part of which will be specifically dedicated to artificial intelligence (AI). This new digital facility, funded under the State-Region Plan Contract by the State, the Region, the Metropolitan Area, and the University of Montpellier to the tune of 2.56 million euros (excluding tax), was selected in particular for its energy efficiency. Housed at Cines, it will benefit from a very high-quality environment, including new cooling techniques that use 95% warm water.
Numerical computing solutions and the use of big data through artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms are at the heart of current scientific and technological advances. The mesocenter led by the University of Montpellier within the Montpellier Institute of Data Science (ISDM) provides advanced solutions to all scientific communities.
As a result, more than 10,000 users and over 400 research laboratories use the ISDM-MESO mesocenter, as do companies (such as BRLI and Predict Services, which specialize in environmental risk prediction). Designed to benefit all communities, it is based on a model that aims to strike the right balance between streamlining and sharing equipment on the one hand, and customizing environments on the other. It thus serves not only experts who also use national and international equipment but also non-experts who have very limited access to this type of equipment—equipment that can nevertheless significantly accelerate the production of highly valuable results.
Equipment that offers the best possible balance between performance and environmental impact
With this equipment, the University of Montpellier—building on its excellence in research and education—is strengthening its ability to meet the needs of researchers, with a particular focus on minimizing its environmental impact.
Selected and configured under the direction of Alexandre Dehne Garcia, a research engineer at INRAE’s DipSO who serves as the cornerstone of the ISDM-MESO mesocenter alongside Technical Director Jean-Luc Oms, a research engineer at the CNRS (LIRMM – Joint Research Unit Research the University of Montpellier), the future system, acquired from Lenovo—a recognized leader in the HPC sector—will feature some 10,000 AMD cores and quad-GPU NVIDIA H100 servers with “full Direct Water Cooling,” 2.8 petabytes of high-performance WekaIO storage, and will be interconnected via two networks, each operating at 200 Gb/s.
This solution will complement the high-quality, 15-petabyte mass storage solution already in place at the mesocenter, which has been the subject of several partnership agreements with research organizations for widespread use by scientific communities (CIRAD, INRAE, Inserm, IRD).
Projects requiring this infrastructure are widespread in Montpellier, both at the heart of mathematical and computational methods and, in particular, in interdisciplinary projects that combine algorithms and artificial intelligence methods with a significant impact on the challenges of “Feeding, Healing, and Protecting.” Ranked highly in numerous rankings—including second in the world in the Shanghai Ranking’s thematic category on ecology—the University of Montpellier aims to combine scientific excellence with a commitment to reducing its environmental impact.
The equipment will be hosted at Cines, a national organization with three missions (high-performance computing, long-term archiving, and hosting), whose expertise was recently recognized with the arrival of the Adastra supercomputer—the most powerful in France and rankedthird in the world for its low environmental impact on the Green 500 list.
In late 2023, Cines received funding from the Ministry of Higher Education and Research MESR) to, on the one hand, upgrade the electrical connections and, on the other hand, install a warm water supply (32°C) to the SM1 machine room, where the new equipment will be housed. This will not only make it possible to measure the equipment’s actual energy consumption but also significantly reduce the environmental impact by eliminating the need to cool the water to low temperatures, as is currently the case.
“The choice of this equipment reflects our projects,” emphasizes Philippe Augé, President of the University of Montpellier.“It combines excellence and commitment. We did not want to acquire the largest or most ‘technically advanced’ equipment, but rather equipment that would allow every scientist to carry out their projects using state-of-the-art technology while balancing the goal of reducing our environmental footprint. We are aware of the responsibility that comes with each of these major infrastructure purchases and have chosen to invest in line with our commitment, even if that meant compromising on the machine’s size.”
The Commitments and Involvement of Local Governments in Partnership with the University of Montpellier
This order was made possible thanks to the efforts of all stakeholders in planning the first tranche of the 2021–2027 CPER. As a result, the Montpellier Metropolitan Area has released its entire contribution (704keuros) for this tranche, which represents a commitment—
The Occitanie Region is contributing 900 keuros toward this order. The Region is actively supporting the University of Montpellier in all projects related to the Occitanie Regional Data Center (Drocc), and this equipment will help renew and strengthen the Drocc-Est service offering, for which the ISDM serves as the operational hub and lead for all stakeholders in Eastern Occitanie (Drocc-Est HPC computing services, Drocc-Est Storage, and Research Cloud Research ).
The government is contributing 606 keuros toward the CPER’s 2022 (300 keuros) and 2023 (306 keuros) budgets.
The University of Montpellier, for its part, has invested 350 keuros in this project and is the main contributor to the mesocenter’s hosting costs.