Taiwania 2 supercomputer successor to launch in May

新一代超級電腦台灣杉二號將於五月開放

New supercomputer will feature GPU-centric architecture utilizing Nvidia H100 GPUs


TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Taiwan plans to leverage Nvidia’s latest chips to build the country's next-generation AI supercomputer.

Taiwan’s current AI-dedicated computing system is Taiwania 2, which has a computing power of 9 petaflops, with 1 petaflop equaling one quadrillion calculations per second, per CNA. Taiwania 2 supports AI research and development, including large-scale data processing and deep learning applications.

When Taiwania 2 was deployed in 2018, its architecture matched international trends, primarily using Nvidia V100 GPUs. However, with the rapid development of AI, increasing computational demands, and advancements in GPUs, the National Science and Technology Council launched a project to build Taiwania 2’s successor.

According to the NSTC's National Center for High-Performance Computing (NCHC), the new AI supercomputer, which is still unnamed, is expected to launch in May with an initial theoretical peak performance of 16 petaflops. It is being built with a GPU-centric architecture, utilizing Nvidia H100 GPUs.

The NCHC plans to gradually expand its computing power, aiming to reach 100 and even 200 petaflops in stages over the coming years. The final scale will depend on budget approvals.

NCHC officials said the upcoming AI supercomputer will accelerate generative AI and general AI applications. In addition, it will integrate with Taiwan’s Trustworthy AI Dialogue Engine to create a one-stop AI development cloud platform.

This will provide computing power and foundational large language models (LLMs), reducing the software and hardware costs for Taiwan’s industries to adopt LLM technology.

The officials said that through this one-stop platform, businesses across various sectors can input their data based on their specific needs to develop internal knowledge bases, virtual administrative assistants, and other applications. This will accelerate AI industrialization and the AI transformation of industries, strengthening Taiwan's AI sovereignty.

The NCHC also operates CPU-based supercomputers for high-performance computing tasks required in various types of scientific research, including Taiwania 3 and Forerunner 1.

The NSTC plans to increase Taiwan’s public-sector computing power to 480 petaflops by 2029. This includes both GPU-based AI supercomputers and CPU-based scientific research supercomputers.

If private sector investments are factored in, Taiwan’s total computing power is expected to exceed 1,200 petaflops by 2029.