New Delhi: Union Ministry of Electronics and IT and the Directorate-General for Communications Networks, Content and Technology (DG CONNECT) of the European Commission on Monday signed an “Intent of Cooperation on High-Performance Computing (HPC), Weather Extremes and Climate Modeling and Quantum Technologies” at a virtual ceremony held simultaneously on November 21 at MeitY, New Delhi and at DG CONNECT, Brussels.
The signatories were Alkesh Kumar Sharma, Secretary, MeitY and Roberto Viola, Director General, DG CONNECT, European Commission. Debasish Prusty, Deputy Chief of Mission, Embassy of India Brussels, Sushil Pal, Joint Secretary, MeitY, Thomas Skordas, Deputy Director General DG Connect and Renita Bhaskar, Minister Counsellor, Delegation of the European Union (EU) to India were present on the occasion.
The Intent of Cooperation builds further on the commitments made by both sides for deepening technological cooperation on Quantum and High-Performance Computing during the EU-India Leaders’ meeting on May 8,2021. Moreover, the signing of the agreement assumes significance in the context of the decision to set up the EU-India Trade and Technology Council (TTC) on April 25, 2022.
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The Intent of Cooperation is aimed at establishing collaboration on HPC applications using Indian and European Supercomputers in the areas of Bio molecular medicines, Covid therapeutics, mitigating climate change, predicting natural disasters, and quantum computing.
Speaking on the occasion, Alkesh Kumar Sharma, Secretary MeitY said “HPC is tackling some of the biggest challenges in the world today. The demand for High-Performance Computing Systems is increasing rapidly in various application domains and under this partnership, India and EU will leverage expertise from both sides to optimize HPC towards developing advanced technology solutions in multiple fields”.
“I warmly welcome this cooperation with our Indian partners, which follows the announcement on establishing the EU-India Trade and Technology Council this spring. By combining our experience, expertise, and building on our long-standing cooperation and trust we can help one another overcome the greatest challenges of our age: COVID-19 and climate change. Moreover, this agreement gives us an exciting perspective for the EU and India to jointly explore the frontiers of Quantum Technologies," Roberto Viola, Director General, DG CONNECT said.
