Problem / Objective

The Center for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC) is intent on setting the benchmark as the facilitator and manufacturer of indigenous high performance computing capabilities for India. Further, the national strategy for AI, termed #AI4All, is focused on promoting inclusive growth using AI. In this endeavour, several strategic collaborations with research institutions, academia and industry partners have been forged, all with the singular goal of developing technology, augmenting R&D and enhancing ethical standards in the use of AI for social good. NVIDIA announced in 2020 that the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC) will be commissioning India’s largest HPC-AI supercomputer ‘PARAM Siddhi AI.

Approach / Solution

November 2020 marked a historic step in moving one step closer to the national goal of building AI for social good. India’s largest HPC AI supercomputer PARAM SIDDHI AI, commissioned by C-DAC, was ranked #62 in the 56th edition of the Top500 list. The biannual Top500 list releases rankings of the most powerful non-distributed computer systems in the world. The supercomputer was developed under the aegis of the three-phase National Supercomputing Mission that aims to provide HPC facilities to 75+ institutions, researchers and academicians – all working together through the National Knowledge Network (NKN). PARAM SIDDHI AI, a machine with 210 AI Petaflops (6.5 Petaflops Peak DP), is based on the NVIDIA DGX SuperPOD reference architecture comprising of 42 NVIDIA DGX A100 systems, connected with NVIDIA Mellanox HDR InfiniBand networking along with indigenously developed HPC-AI engine, software frameworks, cloud platform by C-DAC. Atos is the integration partner, providing the Atos Codex AI Suite to deliver real-time analytics and support AI application development.

Impact / Implementation

PARAM SIDDHI AI’s superior compute capabilities, a mature HPC AI framework and AI libraries in SDK will jumpstart research efforts and support startups to execute largescale projects. It will be capable of such largescale advancements in areas like healthcare, agritech, cybersecurity, robotics and more. With PARAM SIDDHI AI being ranked in the top 100 supercomputers globally, India is marking its dominance as an AI garage of the world.

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