University of Bristol selected to host UK's most powerful AI supercomputer

In a boost for the UK AI sector, the University of Bristol has been chosen to host the UK's planned ISAMBARD-AI supercomputer, named after the city's famous civil engineer. As noted in the University's press release:

The new multi-million-pound Bristol facility will be used by a wide range of organisations from across the UK to harness the power of AI, which is already the main driver of emerging technologies like big data and robotics. The new supercomputing facility will also play a vital role in important areas such as accelerating automated drug discovery and climate research.

The final technical specifications of ISAMBARD-AI do not yet appear to have been decided, but it will be interesting to see whether Nvidia chips are used as in the other upcoming supercomputer, ISAMBARD 3. In any case, it will be interesting to see both the hardware and software technology deployed in ISAMBARD-AI, and whether stakeholders attempt to protect this intellectual property. For example, software that brings about a technical effect at the level of the architecture of a computer is typically capable of being patented in the UK and Europe. Such software may be that which distributes workload over multiple logical cores, for example. 

If you would like to know more about patenting software or AI, please get in touch. You can also read our 3rd Annual AI Report 2023, here, which this year has particular focus on the Medtech and other life sciences sector.