IBM and NCSA call time on Blue Waters super-computer

by Steven Mostyn - Aug 9 2011, 09:28

An ambitious partnership to create a new peta-flop supercomputer has been officially shelved by technology boffins in the United States after three years of invested development.

According to industry heavyweight IBM and the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) at the University of Illinois, the decision to pull the plug on the ‘Blue Waters’ project is connected to excessive costs and unforeseen complexities.

IBM, which has reportedly received funding to the tune of $210 million USD to support the project, had initially expected the four-year contract to garner results before the close of 2011—however, that clearly isn’t going to happen.

“The innovative technology that IBM ultimately developed was more complex and required significantly increased financial and technical support by IBM beyond its original expectations,” reveals an official statement regarding the cancellation.

“NCSA and IBM worked closely on various proposals to retain IBM’s participation in the project but could not come to a mutually agreed-on plan concerning the path forward,” it added.

It’s now likely that IBM will repay the project’s funding and all associated hardware and research equipment it supplied to the NCSA will be returned.

If the Blue Waters project had resulted in a new peta-flop platform, it would have emerged as one of the world’s most powerful Power7-based super-computers.

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