We recently had the pleasure of attending the Advanced Scale Forum (ASF) in Ponte Vedra, Fla., a by-invitation-only summit that brings together executive end-users of high-performance computing (HPC), AI and Big Data with leading solution providers in those fields. Having attended last year’s ASF in Austin, Texas, we were thrilled to see some familiar faces and reconnect with the industry’s leading HPC experts. And while this was our second time attending the event, it was also full of firsts – our first time conducting in-depth executive, media and analyst briefings at the event; sponsoring a leadership networking session; and participating in one of the summit’s exclusive panel discussions.
During the summit, Six Nines’ Managing Director, Eric Terrell, joined the ranks of
distinguished speakers from Hyperion Research, Intel, Comcast and Dell EMC, among others, to address the convergence of HPC with cloud computing, AI/ML, Deep Learning, IoT, Big Data, etc, and the unique data management challenges presented by the shifting paradigm. On a cloud computing panel, Eric explored cloud’s role in using HPC to power AI/ML and Deep Learning and the associated challenges with data gravity, as well as the typical cloud adoption journeys we’re seeing on the front lines with our own HPC customers.
While at the summit, we met with 60 of the nation’s top HPC practitioners and thought leaders to get first-hand insight into what they’re seeing in cloud – including reservations and concerns – as well as share our own customer stories across a number of different verticals: Aerospace/Automotive/Manufacturing, Financial Services, Healthcare/Life Sciences, Oil/Gas/Energy and Media/Entertainment. We also leveraged the opportunity to give these leaders in advanced computing a first-look preview of an innovative new product that automates AI, ML, and Deep Learning for getting answers faster. Currently under development by FluidHPC, LLC©, the new rapid HPC onboarding tool makes it easy to experiment and train your Deep Learning and AI models in parallel at scale with AWS cluster and scheduler management.
Key Trends at ASF 2019
From the opening keynotes delivered by Hyperion Research and Intel’s Tom Kruger to the many panel discussions, board room sessions and one-on-one meetings at this year’s ASF – we were happy to see one clear message ring out above the rest: cloud is becoming ubiquitous to HPC. Transformation is creating a perfect storm that allows users to access geographically disparate resources. AI/ML is feeding more data than ever thanks to IoT, and cloud allows a low enough latency solution to let all this data be used in real-time. And finally, big data is getting bigger. We were excited to hear from organizations who are pushing their workloads and ML models to the edge (where they’re needed) with smart devices, including smart microscopes that can rapidly analyze and detect a cluster of cancerous cells without phoning home. While there are still misconceptions about cost, security and visibility in the cloud, there is one thing the experts clearly agree on – the changing landscape of HPC and the convergence of cloud computing, HPC, AI/ML and Deep Learning will continue to drive HPC to reach new heights of innovation at an unmatched pace.