Supercomputing and artificial intelligence to ride the wave of the digital revolution. Leonardo has chosen Genoa for the “Polo of national competence”, presented today together with the debut of the supercomputer davinci-1. The goal is to accelerate industrial transformation and accompany the growth of the country, also through joint laboratories with the Italian Institute of Technology (Iit), all dedicated to robotics. THE EVENT Stefano Amoroso , communications director, Tommaso Profeta , head of the cyber security division, Carlo Cavazzoni spoke
together with the CEO Alessandro Profumo , Leonardo’s CEO. , head of computational R&D and director of the HPC Lab of Leonardo and Alessandro Massa , head of research laboratories. Profumo first of all thanked Roberto Cingolani, formerly of the company and current minister, creator of Leonardo’s Labs, which includes the davinci-1. Then the focus on the contribution that such technologies can make to industrial strategy. In a world that changes at the speed of light, more than changing the business model it is a question of “guaranteeing its survival” in a future that will be more and more permeated by the use of new technologies. First of all, the ability to quickly process large amounts of data is the main mission of the supercomputer. “Leonardo’s data management and operations,” said Profumo. All this follows the industrial strategy (including the prospects in the European context): “Our strategy is to be strong in helicopters and aircraft and to have cyber and defense electronics as a link.THE IMPORTANCE OF DATA
“Data seen as raw material” is one of the key points identified by Cavazzoni. To be used, the data needs to be transformed, and to do so, processing capabilities are required that also allow the extraction of the data. To work this raw material, therefore, a balance is needed between storage capacity and calculation capacity, which although two distinct capacities, are strongly connected to each other. The supercomputer will allow to extract the value of the data, and will focus on the development of two aspects: the artificial intelligence that deals with extrapolating the algorithms, and the digital twin that allows the replication in the virtual world (the so-called metaverse) of a real object, fundamental to accelerate research, development, testing and prototyping. However, and don’t forget the human component, in fact “in addition to creating technologies, we work with the people who will have to develop them”, Massa specified in audio link. “Innovation is a precondition for development, but it does not exist without human ideas”, echoed Prophet. Technology is designed by man for man “who remains at the center of this design and of Leonardo’s action on Genoa”, added the head of the cyber security division.THE ROLE OF GENOA
For all this, Genoa was chosen, a historic former maritime republic, birthplace of Leonardo’s CEO. “It can be a point of attraction for intelligences that deal with digital,” said Profumo. The goal is “to be like a rock to which coral attaches itself, a starting point”. Precisely the recognized attractiveness of the company in Piazza Monte Grappa will be able to attract young people and workers from all over Italy and the whole world. Furthermore, we plan to use the future Cyber academy “as a platform where our own skills are tested, but we would like to offer this as a platform for other companies”. Therefore, the Academy can also become an attractive point of the city of Genoa, as well as a platform that will also allow other companies in the sector to provide their services, guaranteeing their quality.THE DAVINCI-1 SUPERCOMPUTER
The “davinci-1”, Leonardo’s supercomputer, symbol of technological innovation created in partnership with Atos, and equipped with the latest generation Nvidia A100 accelerators, will also have an attractive factor. Listed since its inception, in December 2020, among the top hundred supercomputers in the world according to the “top 500” ranking, on the podium of the aerospace and defense sector. It boasts an impressive computing power, exceeding 5PFlops (equal to 5 million billion floating point operations per second): to get an idea of the range and equal to ten thousand latest generation personal computers. The davinci-1 physically consists of two blocks, one in front of storage for data storage with thousands of hard disks, and one with the computational capacity and computation processing nodes.TECHNOLOGICAL EXCELLENCE
The supercomputer can count on a battery of over one hundred units, as well as on a very high performance network. The latest hardware and software technologies allow the davinci-1 to store approximately twenty million gigabytes. These performances will allow to accelerate present and future innovation under various aspects: artificial intelligence and autonomous intelligent system, big data analytics, high performance computing, electrification of aeronautical platforms, materials and structures and quantum technologies. It will thus be possible to significantly enhance the industrial digitization process underway, with repercussions on competitive development not only for Leonardo’s company, but for the whole country-system. LEONARDO LABS
On the other hand, the development of disruptive technologies and digital progress in the world are proceeding at an unprecedented pace, and keeping up with the market represents a challenge for any industrial reality in competitive sectors. Leonardo answered you with his “Labs”. Presented just over two years ago, and transversal to the divisions (and therefore to the corporate business areas), they aim to anticipate market demand on the technological front, improving the offer of products and services.
The laboratories make it possible to develop “inter-divisional” programs thanks to the mixed staff who work there, made up of very young researchers from all over the world, and Leonardo experts. The push for advanced research carried out by “Leonardo Labs” is part of “Master the new”, the third pillar (entirely dedicated to innovation) of the Be Tomorrow 2030 strategic plan, presented before the pandemic with the ambition to anticipate the future, offering the country-system elements of resilience and highly qualified employment.
The “Labs” network currently has ten laboratories, present both in Italy and abroad, of which three are joint laboratories with the IIT. Active in eight areas of technological research, they count 60 researchers inserted; winds in the Genoa office. The forecast is to employ about 200 researchers at full capacity in the next two years. “The Labs are technology incubators, which respond to the need to anticipate and improve our products and services, guaranteeing Leonardo a long-term growth prospect”, underlined Massa. It is a question of creating transversal innovations useful for all industrial phases. On the robotics front, the projects in place, in collaboration with the Italian Institute of Technology and the University of Genoa, concern the creation of adaptive robots to be used in complex production environments, with the aim of improving the safety of operators, the flexibility of use in unstructured environments, unforeseen situations and critical environmental conditions, as well as the ability to act independently. The main applications are in the aerospace, civil protection, security and defense sectors.LA CYBER-SECURITY
The cyber skills within the Genoa Labs also allow multi-domain protection with over five thousand networks, protecting 70 thousand users in 130 different countries. There are 90,000 security events monitored every second, with more than 1,500 alarms managed per day. These numbers give an idea of the pervasiveness of the cyber domain, and to meet the needs of this new domain it is necessary to continue innovation and development in the world of digitalization. “Security is a precondition for the protection and development of the country”, highlighted Prophet. Cyber production is today more than ever at the center of the debate. “The pervasiveness of the threat and the increase in attack surfaces have had direct impacts on the lives of citizens (such as attacks on health), an ever more pervasive threat and which is an obstacle to the country’s competitiveness ”, continues the head of the cyber security division. For this reason it can be profitable to accelerate the development of national products, in fact “Leonardo is an industrial partner of the country and part of a wider ecosystem that sees public and private work together to establish technologies that make us increasingly autonomous even in the strategic sector “.
