A Broad International Roll Out of Exascale Systems on the Horizon

As the world's two largest economies and recognized world-class science and technology (S&T) developers, China and the United States are aware of how important technological prowess has become in projecting geopolitical leadership from an economic and national security perspective, and each place significant weight on national S&T polices to help ensure those ends. Recently, the leadership of both China and the United States had occasion to make public their long[1]term strategic S&T visions:

• China's President Xi Jinping highlighted that China is seeking to replace the US as the acknowledged global leader in S&T capability, and Beijing will likely continue its on-going efforts to transform its overall S&T infrastructure from that of a fast follow nation to one of global leadership while reducing its dependency on foreign S&T sources.
• US President Joe Biden emphasized that although the US has a long legacy of world-class technological prowess, emphasis should shift to better position S&T progress to help support key societal imperatives including public health, climate change, and economic inclusiveness. In additional, President Biden charged policymakers with fostering renewed support for R&D funding that not only ensures US S&T primacy going forward but that also fosters the wide base of existing and potential new US commercial entities to quickly turn research breakthroughs into innovative products.

The HPC market is experiencing many challenges and opportunities from the covid-19 virus and its resulting economic impacts. In July 2020, the situation appeared bleak, with a potential for 2020 HPC server revenues being down by as much as 20% year on year. More recently, surveys show an improved outlook, although still with a market contraction of approximately 14% compared with 2019. The Workgroup segment is bearing the near-term brunt of the downside impact.

Covid-related HPC investment impacts are not equally distributed across the vertical markets; several segments are already experiencing increased HPC investments. These include bio/life sciences and government labs. At the same time other verticals are facing a greater negative impact, including oil & gas, manufacturing, and DCC/content distribution