Mexico To Build 314 Petaflop Supercomputer Named Coatlicue

In a move to bolster its technological prowess, Mexico has announced plans to build a supercomputer with a staggering processing capacity of 314 petaflops, named after the Aztec goddess Coatlicue. This ambitious project, spearheaded by President Claudia Sheinbaum, aims to create a public supercomputer that will serve the people, not just a select few.

The Mexican government’s vision is to harness the power of this supercomputer to tackle pressing public issues, such as climate prediction, crop planning, and water, oil, and energy projects. The proposed supercomputer’s processing capacity is seven times greater than that of Pegaso, a privately owned Brazilian computer currently rated as the most powerful in Latin America, with 42 petaflops.

To put this into perspective, a petaflop equals 1,000 trillion calculations per second, a number expressed as 10 to the power of 15. This immense computational power will enable Mexico to make significant strides in various fields, from climate modeling to AI research. According to Jose Merino, director of Mexico’s Digital Transformation Agency, construction of Coatlicue will commence in January and is expected to take 24 months to complete, at a total cost of six billion pesos ($326. 6 million).