Cloud Adoption is Driving HPC Toward Digital R&D

High Performance Computing (HPC) is a critical industry projected to reach $55 billion by 2024, primarily driving advancements in research and innovation through complex algorithmic workloads. Traditionally reliant on on-premises supercomputers and Linux clusters, the industry is experiencing a significant shift towards cloud adoption due to the increasing variety of specialized architectures and simulation software. The inaugural Big Compute report by Rescale highlights this trend, noting that more than half of HPC users now employ multiple public cloud providers, a marked increase from 2018. This transition is partly fueled by the expanding simulation software market, expected to hit $21 billion by 2025, and the need for greater agility akin to the developer experience in enterprise software. The report also underscores the challenge of bridging the talent gap in HPC, as specialists in both scientific domains and cloud infrastructure are scarce, prompting leaders to seek automation solutions for digital R&D.