Sept. 23 — Within the PRACE 3rd Implementation Project (PRACE-3IP), PRACE started the process for a Pre-Commercial Procurement (PCP) on Whole-System Design for Energy Efficient HPC. On September 9, 2014, the signing of contracts with 4 bidders launched the 1st Execution Phase of this PCP.
The process of this PCP is organised in two stages:
- Tendering stage aimed to assess the eligibility of the bidders and their offers
- Execution stage during which the selected bidders are performing the R&D services described in their offers, which in turn consists of three phases:
- Phase I (solution design; duration 6 months)
- Phase II (prototype development; duration 10 months)
- Phase III (pre-commercial small scale product development; duration 16 months)
This Pre-Commercial Procurement (PCP), the first one in the field of HPC in Europe, is a multi-country and multi-partner joint effort, implemented by a consortium composed of several partners of PRACE (CINECA (Italy) as Procuring Entity with CSC (Finland), EPCC (UK), JSC (Germany) and GENCI (France)). PRACE is involved as an advisory body in a Pre-Commercial Procurement (PCP) pilot executed in the context of PRACE’s 3rd Implementation Project (PRACE-3IP).
Four bidders have signed the Framework Contract and Phase I Contract:
- BULL SAS (www.bull.com/)
- E4 Computer Engineering SpA (www.e4company.com/)
- MEGWARE Computer Vertrieb Services GmbH (www.megware.com)
- Maxeler Technologies Limited (www.maxeler.com/)
Following this agreement, the selected bidders will perform the first phase of the Pre-Commercial Procurement process, which is expected to end in March 2015.
Read more about the tender process here: www.prace-ri.eu/
About PRACE
The Partnership for Advanced Computing in Europe (PRACE) is an international non-profit association with its seat in Brussels. The PRACE Research Infrastructure provides a persistent world-class high performance computing service for scientists and researchers from academia and industry in Europe. The computer systems and their operations accessible through PRACE are provided by 4 PRACE members (BSC representing Spain, CINECA representing Italy, GCS representing Germany and GENCI representing France). The Implementation Phase of PRACE receives funding from the EU’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013) under grant agreements RI-283493 and RI-312763.
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Source: PRACE