Defence supercomputer now fully operational

Defence has declared fully operational its state-of-the-art high performance supercomputer capability at the Defence Science and Technology Group (DSTG) facility at Edinburgh, near Adelaide.

After intensive research and project development by Defence Science and Technology Group, the supercomputer is now recognised as having achieved Final Operational Capability, nearly three years after the project was first unveiled.

The secure supercomputer is capable of working orders of magnitude faster than a standard computer to leverage machine learning and artificial intelligence and support complex decision making at scale.

Chief Defence Scientist, Professor Tanya Monro AC, said the supercomputer will undertake critical work for the defence of the nation, supporting many Australian defence platforms to optimise system performance.

“This is a game changer,” she said when the super computer project was first launched in August 2022. “If we want to accelerate the timelines in which we deliver capability for the Australian Defence Force, we need to be able to take these complex platforms and put them inside the computer.

“So we can refine, develop, and essentially skip generations of testing and experimentation that would otherwise have taken years, and condense them down into weeks and days.”

The capability will also bolster secure collaboration opportunities and support world-class research across Australian industry, academic, and national security agencies.

A central element of the 2024 National Defence Strategy is the requirement for Defence to introduce next-generation technologies as soon as possible to enhance our ability to deter an adversary from projecting force against Australia.

“The vital work undertaken across the Defence ecosystem will accelerate the delivery of cutting-edge capabilities for Defence,” Professor Monro said.

The computing infrastructure is known as ‘Taingiwilta’, which means ‘powerful’ in the language of the Kaurna people, and is housed in a purpose-built secure facility at DSTG’s Edinburgh facility called ‘Mukarntu’, meaning ‘computer’.