Bengaluru to soon get a 35-petaflop supercomputer by C-DAC

Bengaluru will soon have a 35-petaflop supercomputer, a high-capacity computing machine, currently being built by the Advanced Computing Development Center (C-DAC).

Petaflop is a unit of measurement for computer processing speed and represents one quadrillion floating point operations per second.

3,000+ servers

Speaking at the inaugural address of the 2025 Supercomputing India Summit, S. Krishnan, Secretary, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, said, “The installation will consist of more than 3,000 servers working in harmony. It is currently undergoing final testing to ensure that all systems and utilities are fully functional, and benchmarks are expected to be completed before its official launch by the end of this year.”

According to Mr. Krishnan, supercomputer will play an important role in research, innovation, high-performance computing, quantum computing and artificial intelligence. Once fully operational, it will enable high-level simulations and scientific research projects in partnership with industry and academia.

Answering a question on the utility of supercomputing tasks, Mr. Krishnan said that the supercomputing task has already yielded tangible results. During the COVID-19 pandemic, simulations on the Param Siddhi AI supercomputer helped determine the potential of ayurvedic medicine against the virus. Collaborations with industry partners, including Lupine Pharma, have leveraged high-performance computing for drug discovery and other research initiatives.

National Supercomputer Mission Expenditures

He also said the exact government spend for the National Supercomputing Mission (NSM 2.0), which focuses on artificial intelligence and semiconductor technology, is yet to be finalized and the funding will combine government support with other mechanisms. Multinational technology firms such as NVIDIA, Intel and AMD are expected to provide initial guidance and support, Mr. Krishnan said.

Under NSM, 37 supercomputers with a cumulative capacity of 39 petaflops have already been put into service in academic and research institutions, supporting scientists, engineers and students with state-of-the-art computing resources.

India will host Supercomputing event for the first time

C-DAC Managing Director Magesh E. said that for the first time, India will host Supercomputing, a global event, from December 9 to 13 at the Manipal Institute of Technology (MIT) in the city. He said the theme ‘Powering the Future: High Performance Computing, Artificial Intelligence and Quantum Computing’ has been designed to align with the National Supercomputing Mission, the country’s flagship initiative that has the mandate to build a network of high-performance supercomputers for research, innovation and national development.