DUG Technology gets A$5m grant from WA govt for Geraldton HPC Campus

DUG Technology secured a Financial Assistance Agreement (FAA) with the Western Australian (WA) State Government for A$5 million in grant funding for its Geraldton High Performance Computing Campus (Geraldton HPC Campus).

This funding, distributed over two years, will be utilised by the Australian tech firm for the construction of the campus’s first data hall.

Upon completion, the data hall is projected to have a capacity of 400 petaflops of compute, signalling a significant increase of thirteen times the current computational power of DUG Technology. This boost potentially positions the new facility amongst the world’s largest supercomputers. The budget for this advancement will be divided, with the state grant covering half of the costs, while the remainder will be sourced from DUG’s existing funds and operational cash flows.

The project’s expenditure also includes the construction of connected infrastructure, along with a lease agreement for 44.5 hectares of land where the Geraldton HPC Campus will be erected. The plan also includes the development of onsite sustainable energy solutions, enhancing overall energy efficiency. To further optimise energy usage, DUG Technology’s patented immersion cooling solution, DUG Cool, will be implemented. Proven to reduce power consumption by over 50% compared to conventional air-cooled data centres, this innovation earned the company an Enterprise Data Centre Design Award in 2019.

DUG Technology’s Managing Director, Matt Lamont, shared his optimism for the project and its implications for both the company and Western Australia. The company sees Geraldton as a strategic location due to its accessibility to renewable power sources, room for expansion, and its low latency to Perth. The facility’s fibre links from Geraldton to Singapore also open potential international opportunities.

“This project has the potential to be transformational for the business and for WA in data processing and storage,” Matt Lamont stated. “We are grateful to the WA State Government for their support, which I expect will pay dividends by creating jobs and placing WA on the global supercomputing map.”

The project also carries significant community impact, with DUG Technology intending to partner with the Yamatji Nation People to provide regional employment opportunities for the Geraldton community.

The Geraldton HPC Campus, upon full completion, is designed to accommodate ten data halls with a cumulative capacity of 4 exaflops (4,000 petaflops).