Hong Kong’s largest artificial intelligence supercomputing center has begun operations, government-backed business hub Cyberport announced on Monday, and its computing power is expected to reach 3,000 petaflops next year to meet the AI sector’s growing demand.
The first phase of the AI Supercomputing Centre will have a computing power of 1,300 petaflops this year, and will scale to 3,000 petaflops in 2025, which is roughly equivalent to processing 10 billion images an hour.
The phased construction of the AI supercomputing center was announced by the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government in October 2023 in Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu’s Policy Address, reflecting Hong Kong’s ambitions to develop into an international hub for innovation and technology.
Sun Dong, secretary for innovation, technology and industry, said he regards computing power as the backbone of AI algorithms and data processing. “The new supercomputing center at Cyberport will play an indispensable role in Hong Kong’s AI development,” he said.
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In addition to offering computing solutions, the facility will also serve as a “cradle” for gathering and cultivating AI-related professionals, Sun said.
To support local universities, research institutes, and businesses in leveraging this supercomputing center, the Hong Kong government in its 2024-2025 Budget announced it would allocate HK$3 billion ($385 million) to launch a three-year subsidy scheme. Eligible applicants under the program could receive a subsidy of up to 70 percent of the facility’s service list price.
Cyberport has received more than 10 applications since the program was launched two months ago, Sun said, adding that the government-appointed Committee of the Artificial Intelligence Subsidy Scheme has completed preliminary reviews of these applications.
Sun said he believes the committee, besides overseeing the funding scheme, can also play an important role in helping shape the development direction of AI in Hong Kong and provide suggestions to the government.
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While the government’s efforts are a significant factor, the industry itself must drive the creation and enrichment of AI application scenarios, Sun said, adding that he encourages industry insiders to play a greater role.
Also at Cyberport on Monday, an AI laboratory was launched, which — according to Cyberport — provides AI stakeholders with an “interactive space” for showcasing their AI products and services.
Among the products displayed by 15 local and international companies, CX GenAIOps is a network operations platform developed by Silicon Valley-headquartered technology firm Cisco. Based on large language models and its own data, the platform is good at anomaly detection and cause analysis.
Hong Kong company Stellaris AI showed its SGPT series — large language models with hundreds of billions of parameters. SGPT-3.0 is currently used in financial analysis, medical diagnosis, tailored education, and automated game development.
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Leveraging the supercomputing center and the AI Lab, Cyberport will continue to expand its AI ecosystem, cooperating with more companies and attracting more AI projects and professionals from the Chinese mainland and global markets, so as to drive research and application, said Cyberport chairman Simon Chan Sai-ming.
The business hub now houses more than 330 startups and leading enterprises that specialize in AI and big data.
