2023-05-29 09:33:39 ET
U.S. semiconductor and microchip company %Nvidia () said it has begun building Israel's most powerful %ArtificialIntelligence (A.I.) supercomputer.
Nvidia added that the cloud-based computer it is developing is costing the Israeli government hundreds of millions of dollars and should be partially operational by year’s end.
Nvidia is reportedly working with 800 start-up firms in Israel and employing tens of thousands of software engineers to work on the new A.I. supercomputer.
Once fully operational, the computer, called “Israel-1,” is expected to deliver up to eight exaflops of A.I. computing power, making it one of the world's fastest processors of information and calculations.
One exaflop can perform one quintillion (1,000,000,000,000,000,000) calculations per second.
The new supercomputer will help Israel train A.I. systems and large language models at much faster speeds, as well as manage more complex problems, said Nvidia.
The supercomputer’s development is being led by a former Mellanox engineering team. Nvidia bought Israeli chip designer Mellanox Technologies in 2019 for $7 billion U.S.
Nvidia’s stock has risen 172% year to date, driven higher by demand for its chips in A.I. applications and platforms. The company’s market capitalization is nearing $1 trillion U.S.