EPCC leads the National Competence Center in the UK (EuroCC@UK) in collaboration with STFC Hartree. Both centres draw on their complementary expertise to deliver the programme’s goals.

The UK is an advanced country in the context of HPC, with a long history of infrastructure provision and computational science research by academia and industry. Both EPCC and the Hartree Centre have significant experience in supporting and collaborating with academia and industry. Since it was established in 1990, EPCC has collaborated with UK science and industry, as well as providing high-quality accessible training courses. The Hartree Centre is funded to work primarily with industry and has undertaken more than 160 collaborative projects with companies since its foundation in 2012, with its training activities focused on meeting the needs of UK industry.

In the context of EuroCC@UK, both centres have been active in a range of areas including training, industry engagement, facilitating scientific and technical expertise transfer, and competence mapping. Here is a selection of our activities.

Training and skills development

EPCC is a recognised leader in high-performance computing (HPC) training and innovative training delivery mechanisms, while the Hartree Centre has a strong focus on training for industry. Over the past year the team at EPCC has investigated innovative training methodologies and accessibility.

The Hartree Centre has also been exploring different ways of engaging industry in training activities, for example business webinars for SMEs on the topics of high-performance data analytics and artificial intelligence techniques.

Many HPC cycles are now consumed by users of pre-compiled research software packages, which requires a different approach from standard HPC training. In response, EPCC has delivered a set of courses relating to package usage to gain feedback on best practice in this area.

Technology transfer and business development

The partners have focused on ensuring that EuroCC@UK has the correct mechanisms in place to support technology transfer in the UK, in terms of HPC know-how, applications, tools and mechanisms. Key components of this approach are being implemented, providing a supportive environment for organisations to explore the latest digital technologies and skills, develop proofs-of-concept, and apply them to industry challenges.

Collaboration with industry

EPCC and Hartree both already have a range of mechanisms for collaborating with industry: from simple cycle sales, consultancy, and development projects, to full-scale collaborations.

An awareness campaign has been started, aligned with normal commercial outreach activities, to promote the opportunities that EuroCC@UK can provide to UK industry. We are also assisting companies in preparing bids for further funding – a key objective of the programme

A pilot study has also been initiated under EuroCC@UK, with additional support by the Scottish Funding Council, which is investigating the application of novel machine learning techniques to the recycling of packaging materials. A second pilot study has been confirmed and we have a pipeline of interested companies with whom we are discussing future pilots.

Connect with EuroCC@UK

Twitter: https://twitter.com/EuroCC_project

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/eurocc/

EuroCC@UK partner centres

EPCC: https://www.epcc.ed.ac.uk/

Hartree Centre: https://www.hartree.stfc.ac.uk/