The (EPI) is a European processor project to design and build a new family of European low-power processors for supercomputers, Big Data, automotive, and offering high performance on traditional HPC applications and emerging applications such as on machine learning. It is led by a consortium of European companies and universities. The project is divided in multiple phases funded under Specific Grant Agreements. The first grant agreement is implemented under the

European Commission The European Commission (EC) is the executive of the European Union (EU). It operates as a cabinet government, with 27 members of the Commission (informally known as "Commissioners") headed by a President. It includes an administrative body ...

program

Horizon 2020 The Framework Programmes for Research and Technological Development, also called Framework Programmes or abbreviated FP1 to FP9, are funding programmes created by the European Union/European Commission to support and foster research in the Europea ...

(FPA: 800928) in the December 2018 to November 2021 time span. The second agreement will be implemented afterwards under the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking which issued a call answered to in January 2021 by the same consortium (H2020-JTI-EuroHPC-2020-02 FPA in EPI (phase II)). The processor is a SoC, of

RISC In computer engineering, a reduced instruction set computer (RISC) is a computer designed to simplify the individual instructions given to the computer to accomplish tasks. Compared to the instructions given to a complex instruction set comp ...

technology, implementing microprocessor cores of

ARM architecture ARM (stylised in lowercase as arm, formerly an acronym for Advanced RISC Machines and originally Acorn RISC Machine) is a family of reduced instruction set computer (RISC) instruction set architectures for computer processors, configured ...

and accelerators, specialised in matrix calculations and

deep learning Deep learning (also known as deep structured learning) is part of a broader family of machine learning methods based on artificial neural networks with representation learning. Learning can be supervised, semi-supervised or unsupervised. ...

for

artificial intelligence Artificial intelligence (AI) is intelligence—perceiving, synthesizing, and inferring information—demonstrated by machines, as opposed to intelligence displayed by animals and humans. Example tasks in which this is done include speech ...

. The processor is designed to be integrated in an

exascale Exascale computing refers to computing systems capable of calculating at least "1018 IEEE 754 Double Precision (64-bit) operations (multiplications and/or additions) per second ( exaFLOPS)"; it is a measure of supercomputer performance. Exascale ...

supercomputer A supercomputer is a computer with a high level of performance as compared to a general-purpose computer. The performance of a supercomputer is commonly measured in floating-point operations per second ( FLOPS) instead of million instructio ...

, but also to be implemented in cars.

Objectives

The aim of the EPI project is to design and build a high-performance, low-power processor, implementing vector instructions and specific accelerators, such as accelerators for AI, with high-bandwidth memory access. The design will be based on the results obtained through an intensive use of simulation, the development of a complete software stack and the use of advanced semiconductor manufacturing technologies. During the development of the processor, a co-design methodology will be implemented to ensure that the processor is suitable for efficiently running many applications and that it is equipped with the appropriate software development tools. The objective of the EPI is to develop European know-how on the design and construction of processors for high-performance computing, allowing Europe technological sovereignty.

Members

EPI is a non-legal entity, a project organized by 30 institutions from 10 countries in Europe. The members of the consortium are:

History

The initiative started in 2015, in the aim to produce an exascale supercomputer by 2023. The first phase of the project started in December 2018.Christian D. "EPI : un premier processeur HPC made in Europe en développement". ''Génération NT''. 10 June 2019
on line.
/ref> In the summer of 2019, the basis of the architecture was decided. In January 2020, the first prototype was presented.{{Cite web, last=Michael Feldman, date=27 January 2020, title=European Processor Initiative Readies Prototype, url=https://www.nextplatform.com/2020/01/27/european-processor-initiative-readies-prototype/, url-status=live, archive-url=, archive-date=, access-date=, website=NextPlatform.com, language=en RISC-V EPAC

Organization of the project

The European Processor Initiative has five streams of operation. The first four are technical streams (Common Platform and Global Architecture, HPC General Purpose Processor, Accelerator, Automotive platform), while the last one is dedicated to the coordination and communication activities.

References

Bibliography

* Michael Feldman. "European Processor Initiative Readies Prototype". ''The Next Platform''. Boone, NC: January 27, 2020. https://www.nextplatform.com/2020/01/27/european-processor-initiative-readies-prototype/ * Michael Feldman. "First European Pre-Exascale Supercomputers Forgo Homegrown CPUs". ''The Next Platform''. Boone, NC: November 20, 2019. https://www.nextplatform.com/2019/11/20/first-european-pre-exascale-supercomputers-forgo-homegrown-cpus/ alks about the delay in EPI* Nitin Dahad. "European Processor Initiative Announces Common Platform For HPC." ''EE Times Europe''. Ebersberg, Germany. November 5, 2019. https://www.eetimes.eu/european-processor-initiative-announces-common-platform-for-hpc/ * Doug Black. "An Update on the European Processor Initiative". ''Inside HPC''. 26 September 2019. https://insidehpc.com/2019/09/an-update-on-the-european-processor-initiative/ * Calista Redmond. "How the European Processor Initiative is Leveraging RISC-V for the Future of Supercomputing". ''Inside HPC''. Westborough, MA. 22 August 2019. https://insidehpc.com/2019/08/how-the-european-processor-initiative-is-leveraging-risc-v-for-the-future-of-supercomputing/ * Sebastian Moss. "European Processor Initiative delivers first architectural designs to the European Commission". ''Data Centre Dynamics''. London: June 4, 2019. https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/six-months-european-processor-initiative-delivers-architectural-designs-european-commission/ * Dan Olds. "The Plan for Europe’s Homegrown Exascale HPC". ''The Next Platform''. Boone, NC: October 20, 2018. https://www.nextplatform.com/2018/10/24/the-plan-for-europes-homegrown-exascale-hpc/ resents EPI initial timeline* European Commission. "European Processor Initiative: Consortium to Develop Microprocessors for Future Supercomputers". ''R&D World''. 26 March 2018. https://www.rdworldonline.com/european-processor-initiative-consortium-to-develop-microprocessors-for-future-supercomputers/

External links

Official website
Science and technology in Europe Horizon 2020 projects Supercomputers ARM architecture Microprocessors