A major new European project, the £10 million UK AI Factory Antenna (UKAIFA), is set to significantly boost the adoption of Artificial Intelligence (AI) among businesses and researchers across the UK. The initiative, led by the University of Edinburgh’s EPCC, the UK’s first National Supercomputing Centre, secured funding from both the EU and the UK Government.
The project is part of the European High Performance Computing Joint Undertaking (EuroHPC JU)’s AI Factories initiative, which aims to foster innovation, collaboration, and research by pooling computing, data, and talent. The UK Department for Science, Innovation and Technology will contribute £2.5 million of the total funding. The AI Factory Antenna is scheduled to begin operations in the new year.
Boosting AI Literacy and Economic Growth
The UKAIFA’s core mission is to help organisations take their first steps in AI, focusing on increasing literacy in the technology and demonstrating how it can boost productivity and deliver economic growth. The project will employ a team of 20 full-time staff at EPCC to develop a range of services for the UK’s start-ups, SMEs, larger industrial companies, and the public sector.
The initiative will work with partners to accelerate AI adoption in key UK sectors, including health, fintech, energy, creative industries, advanced engineering, and robotics.
Professor Sir Peter Mathieson, Principal and Vice Chancellor of the University of Edinburgh, said: “This significant investment underlines Edinburgh’s world-leading capabilities in supercomputing and AI. It also shows the important role universities have in deepening our understanding of cutting-edge technologies, blazing a trail for industry and the public sector, leading to economic growth and job creation. We are delighted with the funding and look forward to working with our partners to deliver on the UK AI Factory Antenna’s ambition for the whole UK.”
Collaboration with German HPC Leaders
The UK’s AI Factory Antenna at EPCC will collaborate closely with the HammerHAI AI Factory, which is based at and coordinated by the High-Performance Computing Center Stuttgart (HLRS), Germany’s first National Supercomputing Centre. This partnership will focus on harnessing the power of AI for the manufacturing, engineering, and research sectors.
Professor Mark Parsons, EPCC Director and UKAIFA Lead Coordinator, said: “EPCC and HLRS have led the use of national supercomputing services in Europe by industry over the past 30 years. The emergence of AI as a key application of supercomputing, and this funding from EuroHPC and the UK Government, is now enabling our organisations to embark on this new collaboration. We’re honoured to be working with HLRS and the University of Stuttgart again.”
Dr. Bastian Koller, Managing Director at HLRS and Lead Coordinator of HammerHAI, said: “Considering the shared commitment and expertise that HLRS and EPCC have in bringing HPC and AI to industry, the UKAIFA is a perfect match for HammerHAI. It will enable us to build on our past successes to focus intently on the most urgent challenges European companies currently face in adopting and scaling up artificial intelligence applications.”
UK Government Commits to AI Leadership
The UK Government selected EPCC to lead the UK’s bid following a competitive expression of interest process.
UK Government AI Minister Kanishka Narayan said: “This is another step in our plan to transform the UK into an AI maker. By working with our neighbours, we’ve giving our best and brightest access to the processing power, data and training needed to develop new breakthroughs in everything from healthcare to climate change. Edinburgh is already set to become home to the UK’s most powerful national supercomputer, making it the perfect place to increase the country’s access to compute and strengthen ties with our European partners.”
Dennis Hoppe, head of the HLRS Department of Converged Computing and project manager of HammerHAI, said: “This partnership reinforces HammerHAI’s commitment to advancing AI innovation across Europe’s industries. Together, we will contribute to accelerating AI adoption, providing secure and scalable AI resources for academia and business.”
