Switzerland Officially Rejoins EuroHPC Joint Undertaking

Switzerland's official return underscores the importance of the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking (EuroHPC JU) for European supercomputing leadership. Switzerland brings longstanding expertise in High Performance Computing (HPC) and hosts one of the world's most powerful supercomputers, Alps, which ranks 8th on the latest Top500 list. 

As a Horizon 2020-associated third country, Switzerland’s users have been able to benefit from EuroHPC JU supercomputers since 2019 to power their research. Thanks to Switzerland’s participation as a member state of the EuroHPC JU between 2019 and 2021, Swiss organisations were actively engaged in various EuroHPC JU-funded projects via Horizon 2020 funding, such as : Ligate on drug design, RED-SEA on interconnect technology, DEEP-SEA on software stack and the  EUMaster4HPC to train the next generation of HPC experts, to name just a few. 

Now, with full association to Horizon Europe and Digital Europe (DEP) Programmes, researchers and scientists residing in Switzerland will also be eligible to apply for EuroHPC JU Research & Innovation calls, which support the development of supercomputing technologies, applications, and software.

Switzerland is an important partner of the European Union (EU) in research and innovation. Researchers from Swiss universities and the private sector have participated in the EU research and innovation framework programmes since 1987. On 20 December 2024, negotiations were successfully concluded on an agreement on Switzerland’s participation in Union programmes. Now that the agreement was signed earlier this month, Switzerland has become an official Horizon Europe and DEP associated country with retroactive effect as of 1 January 2025. 

Switzerland is joining other EuroHPC JU participating states who are not EU members states. These include Albania, Iceland, Israel, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Norway, Serbia, Turkey and the United Kingdom. They are all cooperating with the EU to advance its mission of achieving strategic autonomy in HPC, artificial intelligence (AI), and quantum computing, and to help build a world-class supercomputing ecosystem in Europe.

Anders Dam Jensen, Executive Director of the EuroHPC JU, stated:  

“ We warmly welcome back Switzerland as an official member if the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking. Their return reinforces the EuroHPC JU's position as the cornerstone of European supercomputing excellence. We look forward to continuing our collaboration!”

Michael Gerber, Ambassador, Director General International Programmes and Organisations, Swiss State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation SERI, stated: 

 “Switzerland is very pleased to be an official member of the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking. With our return, we reaffirm our commitment to strengthening the EuroHPC JU’s network and advancing excellence in European supercomputing. We look forward to deepening collaboration and driving innovation together!”

Background

The EuroHPC JU is a legal and funding entity that brings together the European Union and participating countries to coordinate efforts and pool resources with the objective of making Europe a world leader in supercomputing.    

To equip Europe with a cutting-edge supercomputing infrastructure, the EuroHPC JU has already procured 11 supercomputers, distributed across Europe. Three of these EuroHPC supercomputers are now ranked among the world’s top 10 most powerful supercomputers: JUPITER in Germany, Europe’s first exascale system (4^th place), along with LUMI in Finland (9^th place), Leonardo in Italy (10^th place). 

European scientists and users from the public sector and industry can benefit from EuroHPC supercomputers via the EuroHPC Access Calls no matter where in Europe they are located, to advance science and support the development of a wide range of applications with industrial, scientific and societal relevance for Europe. 

Currently, the EuroHPC JU is also overseeing the implementation of 19 AI factories (AIF) across Europe that offer free, customised support to SMEs and startups. Six new AI Factories and thirteen AI Factory Antennas  were selected last month, to complement the existing AIF network. 

Additionally, the EuroHPC JU is deploying a European Quantum Computing infrastructure, integrating diverse European quantum computing technologies with existing supercomputers. EuroHPC JU already inaugurated PIAST-Q in Poznań, Poland and VLQ in Ostrava, Czechia,  marking a milestone in Europe’s leap into the quantum era. 

The EuroHPC JU also funds  research and innovation projects to develop a full European supercomputing supply chain, from processors and software to applications to be run on these supercomputers and know-how to develop strong European HPC expertise.