Utah's Redtail Supercomputer Lets the University Control Its Own AI Research Infrastructure

Universities that operate shared computing systems need the authority to decide how those resources are distributed, managed and protected. The University of Utah's Redtail AI factory supercomputer delivers high-performance computing to researchers, students, administrators and outside collaborators throughout the state. But infrastructure alone is not sufficient to serve such a broad community, according to Manish Parashar, chief AI officer of the University of Utah.

In research, we are always trying to balance research security with doing open research for societal good. Depending on where you are, you might want to lean in one direction or the other. Having that capability to turn the knob becomes so important.

Manish Parashar, chief AI officer of the University of Utah

Parashar discussed the university's approach to computing infrastructure, research governance and the funding required for Utah's growing ambitions in an exclusive interview for the "Sovereign AI: From Strategy to Reality" video series on theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media's livestreaming platform. The conversation with theCUBE Research's Dave Vellante and Amit Eyal Govrin examined how universities can maintain control over their technological capabilities.

Operational sovereignty starts with university expertise

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co. designed and installed Redtail as a complete system. The university's Center for High Performance Computing manages the system, leveraging the same technical knowledge that oversees separate environments for sensitive research, Parashar explained.

They have admin access, they're doing the allocations, they are doing the onboarding. They're doing the management and monitoring … the optimization [and] … the right sizing.

Manish Parashar

The discussion applied theCUBE Research's Five Pillars of Sovereign AI framework—Territorial, Legal, Technological, Operational and Financial—to Utah's situation. The university maintains operational and legal control, while funding comes from state partnerships and donor contributions, Parashar said.

Our overall ecosystem is a hybrid. There's things that are on-prem, there are things that are cloud-hosted, and we always will look at it as a hybrid system. Not everything has to be territorially in a single data center or in the state.

Manish Parashar

Redtail also provides capacity relief for the university's existing facilities by absorbing open research workloads. Current systems handle sensitive and regulated research, including healthcare initiatives, and expanding that protected capacity is a key priority, Parashar noted.

How do we move into a facility that has not only the capacity, but is also compliant with emerging controls that are coming out? We want to grow that out, and that's our focus right now. And what happens is with the Redtail, a lot of our open research moves to that and that frees up capacity in our data center and other places where we can grow out this regulated environment.

Manish Parashar

Statewide ambitions require sustained investment

The university's One-U Responsible AI initiative links research to broader community needs. The effort encompasses entrepreneurship, government partnerships and local issues such as air quality, Parashar explained.

Being open there becomes very, very important because you want to bring the best ideas, the best data — and most often, it is citizen data that's coming in — and be able to then see how we can most effectively use AI to address this very regional challenge. We don't want to lose ideas; we don't want to lose the data that's coming in. We want to assimilate it and make sure the outcome and the warnings that come out of that — the notifications — are as broadly disseminated as possible.

Manish Parashar

Long-term financial viability requires funding for both increased usage and equipment upgrades. Planning for expansion started before Redtail was contracted, and the university is now approaching federal agencies, including the Department of Energy and the National Science Foundation, to support the broader infrastructure, Parashar said.

We are talking to the state and showing them value — very quickly — and convincing them that investing in this is good for the state [and] it's good for its citizens. We are [also] talking to additional philanthropic donors.

Manish Parashar

The university's statewide responsibility extends beyond simply providing access to computing power. Workforce development, training programs and knowledge sharing are integral parts of the infrastructure that operational sovereignty must support, according to Parashar.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/7qlSgbO73pU?feature=oembed

It's not that we need everything to be tightly controlled. We don't want everything to be completely open. We want to make sure we have the ability to right-size it depending on what we are working on.

Manish Parashar