Supercomputing: Mellanox IB and Ethernet Connect 53% of TOP500 HPCs

Mellanox Technologies, Ltd. announced that its IB and Ethernet solutions connect 53% of overall TOP500 platforms or 265 systems, demonstrating 38% growth within 12 months (November 17-November 18).

Furthermore, IB accelerates the top three supercomputers on the TOP500 list: the HPC and AI supercomputer in the world deployed at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the second fastest supercomputer in the US deployed at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and the fastest supercomputer in China (ranked third).

IB ranks first overall for high-speed interconnect on the TOP500 list, connecting 3 to 7.5 times more new supercomputers on the TOP500 list compared to proprietary networks. IB remains the interconnect of choice for HPC and AI infrastructures.

The TOP500 list has evolved in the recent years to include more hyperscale, cloud, and enterprise platforms, in addition to the HPC and machine learning systems. Nearly half of the systems on the November 2018 list can be categorized as non-HPC application platforms, with a vast part of these systems representing US, Chinese and other hyperscale infrastructures, and are interconnected with Ethernet. Mellanox Ethernet solutions connect 130 systems or 51% of the Ethernet systems on the list.

“Mellanox IB and Ethernet solutions now connect the majority of systems on the TOP500 list, an increase of 38% over the last twelve-month period. IB In-Network Computing acceleration engines provide the highest performance and scalability for HPC and AI applications, and accelerate the top three supercomputers in the world. IB enables record performance in HPC and AI, enabling the advancement of academic and scientific research which is reshaping our world. We continue to win new opportunities and are proud to have deployed the first HDR IB supercomputer at the University of Michigan. We expect to see more HDR IB connected platforms this year,” said Eyal Waldman, president and CEO, Mellanox. For the first time, Mellanox’s Ethernet solutions connect the majority of the Ethernet based platforms on the TOP500 list, demonstrating the growing adoption of our 25Gb/s and faster Ethernet adapters, switches and cables for hyperscale, cloud and enterprise infrastructures. The innovations built into our IB and Ethernet solutions deliver the highest ROI for compute and storage infrastructures, and enable the next generation of the world’s leading supercomputers, hyperscale and enterprise datacenters. We have already started planning the NDR 400Gb IB technology that will empower the Exascale supercomputing and machine learning platforms in the future.”

Published twice a year and publicly available, the TOP500 list ranks the world’s most powerful computer systems according to the Linpack benchmark rating system.

Key takeaways from the November 2018 TOP500 list include:

Mellanox connects 53% of overall TOP500 platforms or 265 systems (IB and Ethernet), demonstrating 38% growth in 12 months (November 17-November 18)
IB accelerates the fastest HPC and AI supercomputer in the world – Oak Ridge National Laboratory ‘Summit’ system
IB accelerates the top 3 supercomputers in the world – #1 (USA), #2 (USA), #3 (China)
IB connects 135 supercomputers, or nearly 55% of overall HPC systems on the TOP500 list
IB connects nearly 3X the number of new systems (2018) on the list versus Omnipath, and 7.5X systems versus Cray’s proprietary network
IB is the most used high-speed interconnect for the TOP500 systems
Mellanox connects 130 Ethernet systems (25GbE and faster), or 51% of total Ethernet systems
The TOP500 list has evolved to include both HPC and cloud/hyperscale (non-HPC) platforms
Nearly half of the platforms on the TOP500 list can be categorized as non-HPC application platforms (mostly Ethernet-based)
IB is the interconnect of choice for HPC and AI infrastructures
Mellanox Ethernet is the interconnect of choice for cloud and hyperscale platforms

Mellanox HPC