SDU eScience Center

What SDU eScience Center does

SDU eScience Center is a national high-performance computing (HPC) research infrastructure facility operated by the University of Southern Denmark (SDU) in Odense, established in 2013 through a partnership between SDU and DeiC (Danish e-Infrastructure Cooperation). The center hosts the Danish national supercomputer center and provides Danish academic researchers with access to a portfolio of HPC systems spanning Type 1 interactive HPC (UCloud web platform, YouGene cluster with 6,592 vCPU cores) and Type 2 throughput HPC systems (Computerome 2.0, GenomeDK, Sophia), as well as the European pre-exascale supercomputer LUMI (309 petaflops, ranked 3rd globally on Top500). Compute offerings range from standard CPU nodes to GPU-accelerated nodes equipped with NVIDIA V100, A100, and H100 accelerators, with the center supporting roughly 87 million core hours of Denmark's annual LUMI share.

The center's commercial model is non-existent: it is fully funded by the Danish government through DeiC and SDU, and provides HPC resources free of charge to Danish academic researchers via grant-based application processes. Go-to-market is community-led and event-driven, comprising workshops, training sessions, and an annual Supercomputer Challenge student competition. The center holds ISO 27001 certification for information security and serves all five major Danish universities (AAU, AU, DTU, KU, SDU), with named research users spanning particle physics, life sciences, chemistry, polymer physics, and computational linguistics. Strategic moves in 2026 include launching a platform for spinouts and startups and developing Danish language models, indicating modest expansion beyond pure academic HPC provision.

The organization operates with a small team of approximately 9 staff led by Director Claudio Pica, and is embedded in the European HPC ecosystem through the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking and PRACE consortia, with a track record of 11 PRACE awards and a record-breaking 120 million CPU core hours allocation for lattice QCD research.

Name

SDU eScience Center

Legal name

SDU eScience Center

Website

https://escience.sdu.dk

Company type

Private

Founded year

2013

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

1–10 employees

Short description

SDU eScience Center is a publicly funded national HPC facility at the University of Southern Denmark, providing Danish academic researchers free access to interactive and throughput supercomputing systems, GPU nodes, and the European LUMI pre-exascale supercomputer.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Research Computing Infrastructure

NAICS

Computer Systems Design and Related Services (54151)

SIC

Services-Computer Integrated Systems Design (7373)

akta.pro primary industry

HPC-as-a-Product / On-Prem Managed HPC (Integrated Hardware + Ops) (HDACAOAK)

akta.pro secondary industries

HPC Clusters & Scale-Out Compute (x86/ARM) (HDACAOAB), Research Computing & High-Performance Computing (HPC) User Support (EDALAMAK)

Keywords

• High-performance computing
• HPC infrastructure
• Research computing services
• Supercomputing access
• Academic research support

Headquarters

HQ city

Odense M

HQ country

Denmark

HQ region

Europe

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Infrastructure, Technology or R&D, Operations

Revenue model

1. Government Funding: SDU eScience Center is funded by the Danish government through DeiC (Danish e-Infrastructure Cooperation) and the University of Southern Denmark. The center provides free access to HPC resources for Danish academic researchers, funded by public research budgets.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion2 records

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels5 records

Core offering

SDU eScience Center is a university research infrastructure center that provides High-Performance Computing (HPC) resources, support, and training to academic researchers at SDU and across Danish universities. It operates Type 1 interactive HPC platforms (UCloud, YouGene cluster), provides access to Type 2 national throughput HPC systems (Computerome 2.0, GenomeDK, Sophia), and grants access to the European pre-exascale LUMI supercomputer. Services include resource allocation, code optimization, GPU transition support, and HPC training workshops.

Product overview

SDU eScience Center is a university research infrastructure center that provides High Performance Computing (HPC) services. The organization offers a unified platform for accessing various HPC systems including the UCloud web platform for interactive computing, the YouGene cluster, and connection to national DeiC HPC infrastructure (Type 1 Interactive HPC and Type 2 Throughput HPC systems including Computerome 2.0, GenomeDK, and Sophia). Additionally, the center provides access to the European pre-exascale supercomputer LUMI. The portfolio includes compute resources ranging from standard CPU nodes to GPU-accelerated nodes (NVIDIA V100, A100, H100), with services covering resource allocation, code optimization, and grant application support for HPC projects.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• UCloud Web-based platform for accessing interactive HPC resources, providing SDU researchers access to the YouGene cluster hosted at SDU and OpenStack cluster at AAU. Part of the DeiC Interactive HPC Type 1 system.
• YouGene Cluster High-performance computing cluster hosted at SDU, forming part of the Type 1 DeiC Interactive HPC system. Consists of 94 compute nodes with 6,592 vCPU cores and 40 TB memory.
• DeiC Interactive HPC Type 1 national HPC system focused on interactive computing and easy access for users. Combines the YouGene cluster at SDU with OpenStack cluster at AAU.
• DeiC Throughput HPC Type 2 HPC systems with large number of cores for high-throughput performance. Includes Computerome 2.0, GenomeDK, and Sophia clusters available at national level for SDU researchers.
• LUMI Access European pre-exascale supercomputer (Large Unified Modern Infrastructure) located in CSC's data center in Kajaani, Finland. Denmark participates in consortium, with portion reserved as national resource. LUMI-C partition has 1,536 compute nodes, 196,608 CPU cores, and 440 TiB memory.
• Computerome 2.0 Access Jointly owned by DTU and KU. Type 2 HPC system with 791 compute nodes, 31,640 CPU cores, 225 TB memory, 8 PB storage. Includes thin nodes, fat nodes, and GPU nodes with NVIDIA Tesla V100.
• GenomeDK Access Maintained by Aarhus University. Type 2 HPC system with 213 compute nodes, 6,776 CPU cores, 61 TB memory, 11.5 PB BeeGFS storage. Includes GPU nodes with NVIDIA Tesla V100.
• Sophia Access Collaboration between DTU, DTU Wind Energy and DTU Mechanics. Type 2 HPC system with 512 compute nodes, 16,384 CPU cores, 70 TB memory, 1 PB CEPH storage.

Quantifiable outcome

• Access to 309 petaflops of computing power through LUMI
• +2 more outcomes

Named customers6 records

Segments2 records

Ideal customer profiles2 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature4 records

Partnerships

Seven partnerships are on record, tiered core and minor.

• DeiC (Danish e-Infrastructure Cooperation)coreStrategic or Co-development PartnerDeiC is the national e-infrastructure consortium providing HPC services to Danish researchers. SDU eScience Center collaborates with DeiC to host and operate national HPC systems including UCloud and provide access to Type 2 systems. SDU hosts the national supercomputer center on behalf of Danish universities.
• EuroHPC Joint UndertakingcoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerEuroHPC JU is the European consortium operating pre-exascale supercomputers including LUMI. Denmark participates in the consortium, giving SDU researchers access to European HPC resources.
• PRACE (Partnership for Advanced Computing in Europe)coreStrategic or Co-development PartnerPRACE provides European researchers access to Tier-0 supercomputers. SDU has a proud tradition of receiving PRACE grants, with 36 proposals awarded over 1 billion core hours since 2010.
• Aarhus University (AU)minorStrategic or Co-development PartnerCollaborates with SDU on DeiC Interactive HPC operations and shares OpenStack cluster resources. Partner researchers contribute to SDU eScience Center projects.
• Technical University of Denmark (DTU)minorStrategic or Co-development PartnerCollaborates on national HPC systems including Computerome 2.0 (jointly owned with KU) and Sophia cluster. DTU participates in HPC knowledge sharing and training.
• Aalborg University (AAU)minorStrategic or Co-development PartnerCollaborates on DeiC Interactive HPC providing OpenStack cluster access. AAU researchers utilize SDU eScience Center HPC resources for various research projects.
• University of Copenhagen (KU)minorStrategic or Co-development PartnerCo-owner of Computerome 2.0 national HPC system with DTU. KU researchers access SDU HPC infrastructure through DeiC national allocations.

Scale indicators7 records

Recent moves7 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• UNINETT Sigma2: Norway's national provider of HPC services and e-infrastructure for academic research. Operates similar national allocation models and access to European Tier-0 resources, mirroring SDU's role for Denmark.
• SURF: Netherlands' cooperative for ICT in education and research. Operates national HPC and data infrastructure for Dutch academia, providing a directly comparable national research-computing model.
• SNIC (Swedish National Infrastructure for Computing): Sweden's national HPC infrastructure coordinating compute resources across Swedish universities. Provides directly analogous researcher-facing services and national allocations.
• DeiC (Danish e-Infrastructure Cooperation): SDU's core national partner and the consortium coordinating Danish e-infrastructure. Functions as a peer/funder relationship; DeiC sets policy while SDU executes on the HPC side.
• CSC – IT Center for Science: Finland's national HPC center and the host operator of the LUMI supercomputer. Directly comparable as a national e-infrastructure body providing supercomputing access to academic researchers and operating Tier-0 systems.

Broad incumbents

• HLRS (High-Performance Computing Center Stuttgart): Germany's national HPC center operating the Hawk and Hunter systems. Comparable as a Tier-1/2 HPC provider to academic users with strong GPU and AI workload capabilities.
• Jülich Supercomputing Centre (JSC): One of Europe's leading HPC centers operating peta/exascale systems (JUPITER). Comparable as a larger, established European HPC operator serving national and European researchers with similar GPU and cluster offerings.

Regional players

• IT4Innovations: Czech national HPC center operating the Barbora and Karolina supercomputers. Comparable as a national academic HPC provider in a smaller European country, though serving a different geography.
• GENCI: France's national HPC agency coordinating allocations to French researchers across national centers (TGCC, IDRIS, CINES). Comparable as a national coordinating body for academic HPC access.

Others

• EuroHPC Joint Undertaking: European legal entity funding and operating pre-exascale and exascale supercomputers including LUMI. Acts as the upstream infrastructure provider and policy maker for SDU's Tier-0 access.

Market position

Strengths4 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/sdu-escience-center

Compliance1 record

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles1 record

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

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M&A

Investments

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Frequently asked questions about SDU eScience Center