History

2022

• Inauguration of new offices LCP, in Via Chiosso 7a, Porza.
• Closure old offices in Via Zurigo, Lugano.

2020

• In November 2020, the first cabinets of the “Alps” research infrastructure have been installed and accepted.
• On the first of January 2020, CSCS internally moved at ETH Zurich from the domain of the Vice President for Human Resources and Infrastructure, Prof. Ulrich Weidmann to the Vice President for Research and Corporate Relations, Prof. Detlef Günther.

2019

• Switzerland, represented by ETH Zurich, CSCS joined LUMI consortium that will develop one of the pan-European pre-exascale supercomputers, top-of-the-range exascale supercomputers for processing big data, based on competitive European technology.
• “Piz Daint” takes on Tier 2 function in Worldwide LHC Computing Grid.
• Tenth edition of the HPC-AI Advisory Council (HPCAIAC) conference. The conference annually draws about 130 professionals to Lugano to discuss the latest technology developments.

2018

• A new office is rented in Lugano in Via Zurigo to host the increasing number of staff members.

2017

• CSCS becomes PRACE (Partnership for Advanced Computing in Europe) fifth hosting member. Piz Daint is the most powerful system in the PRACE pool of resources.
• Installation of a new tape library with an initial potential capacity of 120 PB.

2016

• 25th anniversary.
• "Piz Daint" upgraded to enable a consolidation of scientific computing and data analytics services.
• MeteoSwiss moves its operational numerical weather prediction suite to a hybrid multi-GPU compute nodes system.

2015

• Installation of a micro hydro plant at the CSCS pumping station to generate electricity using cooling water from the supercomputers.

2014

• First PASC Conference: PASC14.
• Inauguration of the upgraded "Piz Daint", the first hybrid petascale supercomputer in Europe.

2013

• "Piz Daint" upgraded to hybrid (multicore + GPU accelerator).

2012

• Cray XC30 "Piz Daint" (multicore)
• Launch of the Platform for Advanced Scientific Computing (PASC) initiative.
• Official inauguration of the new building.
• Move from Manno to the new location in Lugano.

2011

• Completion of construction work at the Parco Ciani pumping station.

2010

• Start of construction of the new building in Lugano.

2009

• First European Workshop on HPC Centre Infrastructures.
• Launch of the High Performance and High Productivity Computing (HP2C) initiative.
• Cray XT5 "Monte Rosa".
• Implementation of the national High-Performance Computing and Networking Strategy (HPCN).

2007

• Presentation of a national strategy for ensuring timely participation of Swiss research in international developments toward petascale computing.
• Start of hosting the cluster for the Swiss Institute of Particle Physics (CHIPP).
• IBM P5-575 "Blanc".

2005

• Cray XT3 "Piz Palu".

2002

• IBM SP4 "Venus".

2001

• MeteoSwiss begins computing weather forecasts at CSCS.

1999

• NEC SX5 "Prometeo".

1996

• NEC SX4 "Gottardo".

1993

• CSCS selected by NEC Corporation as the site for NEC's High-Performance Computing Software Development Center; collaboration in Parallel Processing.

1992

• 1st October: official inauguration.

1991

• "SWITCH" network established, linking the Federal Institutes of Technology with CSCS.
• CSCS begins operation on 30 September 1991.
• Installation of the first supercomputer, a NEC SX-3/22 "Adula".

1990

• The center's location is decided: a new building in Manno.

1988

• Start of discussions on locating the Swiss National Supercomputing Centre in Ticino.

1986

• Validity of the Federal decree limited to five years starting 1 October 1986; funding thus had to be used by 30 September 1991.

1985

• Federal decision to invest 40 million Swiss francs in a high performance computing center (> CSCS) and 15 million Swiss francs in developing a national research network for making the supercomputer accessible to Switzerland's leading universities (> SWITCH).

1980

• The Federal Government identifies a lack of well-trained computer scientists in Switzerland.