Welcome to the second last issue of ISC News for the season. There are just 46 days left before the community gets together at ISC High Performance. In this issue we would like to acquaint you with our industry track, which focuses on Industrie 4.0., a hot topic that is gaining traction among manufacturers in Germany and abroad.
On his valedictory trip to Germany last week, US president Barack Obama opened the Hannover Fair as Germany’s partner country. The theme of the trade show was also Industrie 4.0. The main idea behind it is the digital revolution and the use of electronics and IT to further automate production, which will influence manufacturing companies worldwide. And this is, by far, not limited to Germany.
This brings us back to HPC technologies and applications that affect and support cyber-physical systems, the Internet of Things and the Internet of Services. In our Industry Track, Industrie 4.0 will be addressed with a special presentation about the virtual factory, a session on applications, and another on tools for the digital factory. Beside these presentations, the track will also cover traditional HPC applications in commercial settings. The European HPC experience with commerce will be demonstrated in a special session, and last but not least, there is a panel on what cloud computing can do for industry.
As this track is designed to meet the interests of commercial users, we hope to see engineers, manufacturers, and other end users, in addition to computing specialists and marketing staff from vendors serving this community.
Register by next Wednesday, May 11, to reap the early-bird savings.
Best regards,
The ISC Program Team
Early-Bird Registration Ends Next Wednesday!
Exactly a week from now, on May 11, the early-bird registration comes to an end. By registering by that date, you’ll be able to save 45 percent off the onsite fees.
Recapturing ISC Conference Keynote
This year, Baidu’s chief scientist Andrew Ng has been invited to ISC High Performance to deliver the conference keynote. In his keynote, Ng will describe how HPC is supercharging machine learning.
According to the keynote abstract, “AI is transforming the entire world of technology. Much of this progress is due to the ability of learning algorithms to spot patterns in larger and larger amounts of data. Today this is powering everything from web search to self-driving cars. This insatiable hunger for processing data has caused the bleeding edge of machine learning to shift from CPU computing, to cloud, to GPU, to HPC.”
Ng’s observation is especially reassuring to the HPC industry. This year’s conference program reveals that this combination of technologies is changing the world of science and engineering, as well as every sector of the economy that relies on them.
ISC 2016 Distinguished Speaker Series
We are pleased to announce that we will be bringing five renowned experts in computational science to this year’s conference as part of our Distinguished Speaker series. Topics will include exascale computing efforts in the US, the next supercomputers in development in Japan and China, cognitive computing advancements at IBM, and quantum computing research at NASA.
Tuesday, June 21
Dr. Paul Messina, Senior Strategic Advisor & Argonne Distinguished Fellow, will speak about “The Path to Capable Exascale Computing.” This topic has been the subject of study and analysis for almost ten years and Messina strongly feels that the time has come to mount a focused effort that applies the insights learned by those studies to build exascale systems. In his talk, Messina will present an overview of the efforts that are underway to establish a joint DOE-SC and NNSA project that will result in a capable exascale ecosystem and the scientific and engineering applications that can take advantage of it.
Prof. Dr. Yutaka Ishikawa, who is the Project Leader of the Flagship 2020 Project at RIKEN AICS, will deliver a talk about the new supercomputer that is being designed in Japan to replace the K computer. In this talk, titled “The Next Flagship Supercomputer in Japan,” Ishikawa will introduce the architecture of the machine and elaborate on how the system software is being developed with the help of international research collaborations. A heterogeneous operating system, Linux and a light-weight kernel is also being developed to build suitable runtime environments for applications.
Prof. Dr. Guangwen Yang, the Director of the National Supercomputer Center at Wuxi, China. Yang will be delivering a talk titled “The New Sunway Supercomputer System at Wuxi.” In the presentation, Yang will describe the hardware and software that will make up the Sunway system, along with some recently developed applications that are to be run on it. The new supercomputer is scheduled to be publicly announced this summer.
Wednesday, June 22
In his talk titled “The Era of Cognitive Business: Applications of IBM Watson for Smarter Industries,” IBM Fellow Dr. Alessandro Curioni, will describe the rapidly emerging field of cognitive computing and how it is being applied for industry use. Curioni, who is the vice president and director of the IBM Research Lab in Zurich, will outline how the company’s Watson platform has evolved from its roots as a Jeopardy champion into a system capable of tackling real problems in healthcare, consumer goods, insurance and other commercial realms.
The 2016 Distinguished Speaker Series will end with an insightful talk into Quantum Computing at NASA: Challenge & Opportunities by Dr. Rupak Biswas, the Deputy Director of Exploration Technology at NASA Ames Research Center. Biswas will report on the research taking place at NASA’s Quantum Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (QuAIL) and the ways in which the technology can be applied to the space agency’s mission. In particular, he will provide an overview of NASA’s latest D-Wave quantum computing system and how it is performing on a set of selected application areas critical to the agency.
NEW: Social Media #JustStartToday Sessions Exclusive for ISC 2016 attendees
Our partner McMahon Consulting will be bringing their tools and expertise to provide a face-to-face review of your LinkedIn social media profile. Held during coffee breaks in the exhibition hall (#1205), the McMahon Consulting team will discuss your social media goals, review your LinkedIn profile, and provide advice on how to improve your online presence.
Why is your social media profile vital? It’s a platform to demonstrate to the market your expertise and build a strong network of contacts. The team will cover things such as:
How to set up your profile
What to include for summary, employment and skills
Improving your LinkedIn presence with endorsements, recommendations and other features
How to appropriately share content
How to engage your audience and those you didn’t even know were interested
Whether you are just starting in your social media journey or looking to improve your activities, this consultation will benefit you. Sign up details will be available early June.
This year, Baidu’s chief scientist 
Our partner McMahon Consulting will be bringing their tools and expertise to provide a face-to-face review of your LinkedIn social media profile. Held during coffee breaks in the exhibition hall (#1205), the McMahon Consulting team will discuss your social media goals, review your LinkedIn profile, and provide advice on how to improve your online presence.
