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After a decade of intensive innovation efforts, the EU institutions and the member states have collaboratively developed the system of new standards in computational performance and have established fundamental changes in the digital aspects concerning scientific research and innovation processes. The JUPITER, European first so-called “exascale supercomputer” was inaugurated recently; the event has marked the beginning of a new stage in the European digital transition by using supercomputing.
Background
The JUPITER has been officially ranked as Europe’s most powerful supercomputer and the fourth fastest worldwide; it combines unmatched performance with a strong focus on sustainability.
The system runs entirely on renewable energy and features cutting-edge cooling and energy reuse, making it the world’s most energy-efficient supercomputer module, as confirmed by its first position in the Green-500 ranking.
More on energy in digital service in “Energy resource for the digital transition: growing demand” in: https://www.integrin.dk/2025/08/25/energy-resource-for-the-digital-transition-growing-demand/
AI Factories
With computing power exceeding one exaflop, JUPITER is able to transform science, innovation and policymaking in the European member states: thus, researchers will be able to run climate and weather models at kilometre‑scale resolution, enabling much more precise forecasts of extreme events such as heatwaves, heavy storms and floods.
The so-called AI-factories are representing huge opportunities for researchers and decision-makers in supporting the use of super-computing facilities. Thus, the European High Performance Computing Joint Undertaking, EuroHPC has already selected 13 proposals to establish and operate numerous AI Factories across Europe.
More on the gateway to access EuroHPC AI Factories in: https://www.eurohpc-ju.europa.eu/index_en
AI Factories are dynamic digital systems that foster innovation, collaboration and development in the field of artificial intelligence; i.e. they bring together computing power, data and talented scientists to create cutting-edge AI models and applications. They also foster collaboration across European member states, linking supercomputing centres, universities, SMEs, industry and financial actors. AI Factories serve as hubs driving advancements in AI applications across various sectors such as health, manufacturing, climate, finance, space, etc.
The EU-wide AI Factories will bring together basic ingredients needed for success in the AIs deployment, such as computing power, sufficient data and scientific talent; besides, they will provide access to massive computing power that start-ups, industry and researchers need to develop their AI models and systems. For example, European large language models or specialised vertical AI models can now effectively focus on specific sectors and/or domains.
More on the first European 13 AI factories in: https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/ai-factories
The AI “continental” action plan reinforces EU investment in AI Factories: i.e. during 2025-2026, at least 15 AI factories and several “antennas” (associated to AI-optimised supercomputers in existing AI Factories, with the EU budget of €10 billion from 2021 to 2027) are expected to be operational, enabling the pan-European AI system to further promote growth by prioritising AI’s access for startups and SMEs.
AI system: gigafactories
The Commission has identified the establishment of AI Factories as a strategic priority in the digital transition; the strategy was announced in the 2024 AI Innovation Package.
More in: https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/factpages/ai-innovation-package
On the “continental plan” in: https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/factpages/ai-continent-action-plan
As the plan revealed, at least 9 new AI optimised supercomputers would be procured and deployed across the EU member states, which would be more than triple the current EuroHPC AI computing capacity.
At the end of June 2025, the Commission has also announced an overwhelming number of proposals to set up European AI Gigafactories, with 76 expressions of interest across 16 Member States.
AI Gigafactories are large-scale digital facilities dedicated to the development and training of next-generation AI models containing trillions of parameters. To achieve this, AI Gigafactories will bring together computing power – over 100,000 advanced AI processors – and a strong emphasis on power capacity, reliable supply chains, advanced networking, energy efficiency and the AI-driven automation.
The AI Gigafactories concept builds on the AI Factories initiative, harnessing Europe’s cutting-edge EuroHPC supercomputing network to realise the EU’s ambition of becoming the world’s leading AI continent. AI Gigafactories will be state-of-the-art, large-scale AI compute and data storage hubs, purpose-built to develop, train, and deploy next-generation AI models and applications at hyperscale, e.g. models with hundreds of trillions of parameters. By integrating vast computing power, energy-efficient data centres and AI-driven automation, these facilities will set new benchmarks for AI model training, inference and deployment.
More on EU super-computers in: https://www.eurohpc-ju.europa.eu/supercomputers/our-supercomputers_en
Modern facilities
The giga-factory JUPITER, which was inaugurated recently in Germany by Chancellor Fr. Merz and European Commissioner E. Zaharieva, signalises the creation of the first ever European supercomputer capable of performing one exaflop (equivalent to one billion times one billion calculations per second, i.e. 1 ExaFLOP/s).
Presently, it is the most powerful digital system in Europe, combining outstanding performance with exceptional energy efficiency.
This next-generation supercomputer represents a major leap in European technology and its unprecedented computing capacity will have a substantial impact on scientific progress across Europe.
It will also bolster European competitiveness and technological sovereignty, while expanding frontiers of scientific simulations, and facilitate the development of advanced AI models for socially relevant applications, ranging from medicine and highly precise climate and weather forecasts to the optimisation of sustainable energy systems and multilingual European language models.
Note. JUPITER’s abbreviation stands for “Joint Undertaking Pioneer for Innovative and Transformative Exascale Research”; this unique digital facility is owned and co-funded in half by two entities: a) the European High Performance Computing Joint Undertaking (EuroHPC JU); and b) the remaining half is funded equally by two German ministries – the Federal Ministry of Research, Technology and Space, and the regional Ministry of Culture and Science of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia.
With JUPITER, the EU-27 has entered the exascale era in digitalisation, unlocking unprecedented computing power to drive scientific discovery, industrial innovation and regional technological sovereignty.
JUPITER is expected to support the development and deployment of AI solutions; its supercomputing capability will support the future AI Factory’s ideas (so-called, JAIF) announced in March 2025, which will train cutting-edge large language models (LLMs) for generative AI and next‑generation digital technologies.
More in: https://www.eurohpc-ju.europa.eu/jupiter-launching-europes-exascale-era-2025-09-05_en
Perspectives
JUPITER represents a €500 million joint investment by the EU and Germany channelled through the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking. It is part of Europe’s wider strategy to develop a network of AI Gigafactories: large-scale, energy‑efficient computing hubs dedicated to training and deploying frontier AI models.
By the end of 2025, JUPITER will be complemented by the JUPITER AI Factory (JAIF) , selected in March 2025 as part of the EuroHPC JU’s initiative to establish AI Factories across Europe, to support industry, particularly start-ups and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), to harness its facilities to develop powerful, secure AI applications that conform with data protection requirements.
More on the EU approach to AI in: https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/european-approach-artificial-intelligence