Addis Ababa Science and Technology University (hereafter AASTU) is one of the young and dynamic national universities that was established in 2011 to play a leading role in technological innovation and economic transformation of Ethiopia by undertaking problem solving and high-impact research projects. The main focus of research activities at the University is to boost the global competitiveness of local industries and business institutions. In GTP II, Ethiopia has paid a special attention to the development and application of ICTs, where academic and research institutions like AASTU are expected to play a key role.

AASTU recognizes the vital role of advanced research and training programs in enhancing the productivity and prosperity of the national economy. In its endeavor to address the major economic and social problems of the country, AASTU has launched 8 selected centers of excellence (CoEs), including the CoE for High Performance Computing and Big Data Analytics (hereafter HPC and BDA). The main aim of the CoE for HPC and BDA is to serve as a common computational platform for advanced research and training programs. The initiative to establish the CoE for HPC and BDA is, therefore, a nation-wide effort to build a world-class HPC system and data center, which will provide all researchers across the country with state-of-the-art supercomputing resources and services.

Broadly speaking, HPC system is an integrated supercomputing environment designed to solve large-scale and complex computational problems in science and technology. As the demand for real-time data analysis and simulation grows, HPC has become a vital resource for researchers across all academic disciplines and industrial sectors.

Our vision is to become one of the leading HPC and BDA research centers in Africa by developing innovative solutions to national and regional development challenges by 2025. In particular, the CoE is aimed at enabling Ethiopian researchers and industrialists to exploit the unprecedented potential of HPC and Big Data Analytics to develop new insights and innovative solutions.

 Our Mission is:

  • To provide a supercomputing platform that can support large-scale and data-intensive research projects with a view to generate highly effective and more relevant solutions.
  • To nurture new generations of scientists and engineers who will develop disruptive technologies that can transform our national economy into a highly industrialized and knowledge-based economy.

The goal of the CoE is to provide all interested researchers and engineers with the state-of-the-art supercomputing resources and services. Some of the specific objectives include:

  • To establish state-of-the-art HPC systems and data centers that is easily accessible to all interested researchers and engineers.
  • To address the national needs for highly qualified system engineers and data analysts.
  • To establish advanced research labs that can support large-scale and data-intensive research projects.
  • To collaborate with related industries and business institutions in initiating and undertaking advanced research projects.
  • To produce software solutions that can address the computational demands of local and global industries.

Major Phases of the CoE

Phase I ((2016-2017): The initial phase of our project focuses on the acquisition of appropriate resources and the establishment of the HPC  and  Data Center along with required research labs.

Phase II (2018-2019): During the second phase of our project, we will focus on capacity building and the establishment of professional partnerships with related research centers and industries.

Phase III (2018-2019): The main focus of the third phase is the establishment of Innovation Hubs and Incubation Centers at AASTU.

As indicated earlier, the CoE for HPC and DBA is aimed at addressing a wide range of economic and societal challenges through the applications of HPC and BDA. Currently, we would like to focus on the following core research areas:

  1. Business Intelligence and Analytics
  2. Weather Analytics and Forecasting,
  3. Network and Information Security,
  4. Computational Science,
  5. Genomics and Bioinformatics, and
  6. Precision Agriculture (Agro-Informatics).

Kula Kekeba (PhD)
Coordinator, Center of Excellence for HPC and Big Data Analytics
Assistant Professor, College of Electrical and Mechanical Eng. (AASTU)
Tel.: 251-118959486
kula.kakeba@aastu.edu.et
kuulaa@gmail.com
P.O. Box 16417
Addis Ababa Science & Technology University,
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

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