FHNW Establishes HPC Lab to Support Next-Gen AI and Scientific Computing

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Off the Wire Press Releases
June 4, 2026 — Data volumes are growing rapidly, AI applications are becoming more complex, and many questions in science and industry can only be addressed with specialized computing power. This is precisely where High Performance Computing (HPC) comes in. With its recently opened HPC Lab, the FHNW School of Computer Science has created an environment in which such computationally intensive applications can be developed, tested, and put into practice.
HPC refers to the interplay of powerful hardware and optimized software to efficiently process large amounts of data and perform complex simulations. Whether in climate research, medicine, industry, or artificial intelligence, HPC is now a fundamental prerequisite for innovation and scientific progress.
Against this backdrop, the University of Applied Sciences and Arts Northwestern Switzerland (Fachhochschule Nordwestschweiz, FHNW) is strategically developing expertise in this area with the HPC Lab. It is part of the strategic realignment of the FHNW School of Computer Science, which was founded in January of last year. In this context, labs were established as centers of excellence. They serve as open spaces for experimentation and development and promote exchange between students, industry partners, and the FHNW.
New Infrastructure for Research and Innovation
The HPC Lab was officially opened on May 28, 2026, with around 90 guests in attendance. Partners, interested parties, and employees gained unique insights into the new infrastructure, featuring high-performance GPU and CPU clusters, scalable storage solutions, and specialized software environments for AI, simulation, data analysis, and machine learning. This enables the efficient implementation of demanding applications such as training AI models, simulating physical processes, and conducting data-intensive analyses.
However, CPUs and GPUs are not the end of the road for HPC development. New computing technologies such as Dataflow, wafer-scale engines, neural processing units, and energy-efficient AI accelerators could create entirely new possibilities in computing through significantly higher speeds and lower energy consumption. The HPC Lab is a platform for experimentation and technology evaluation that focuses on practical applications of new hardware and is open to both industry and academic partners.
Responsibility and Sustainability in HPC
At the same time, the increasing importance of HPC is also bringing its ecological footprint more sharply into focus. Computing-intensive applications require considerable resources. The FHNW School of Computer Science takes this development into account and pursues the goal of using high-performance computing responsibly and in a resource-efficient manner. Topics such as efficiency, monitoring, and the sustainable use of infrastructure are therefore considered from the outset and integrated into teaching and research.
“The increased performance of HPC systems has been crucial for remarkable breakthroughs in AI. Training large language models would be impossible without fast and integrated GPU clusters,” said Prof. Dr. Tomasz Kacprzak, Head of the HPC Lab. “But this is just the beginning: In the future, more computing power will enable new inventions in the field of artificial intelligence. With the HPC Lab, we aim to be the central player in technology transfer in this development.”
From Theory to Practice
The HPC Lab is closely integrated into the curriculum of the FHNW School of Computer Science and forms a central learning environment, particularly within the AI & High Performance Computing specialization of the Bachelor of Science in Computer Science. Students acquire a solid computer science education with a clear focus on AI and HPC, applying their knowledge in practical projects from the outset. They develop and train AI models for applications in industry and research and learn to implement these efficiently on scalable infrastructures.
For example, students are working on the development and tuning of AI models for industrial applications, such as for quality control in production, for the analysis of large sensor data streams, or for predictive models in energy and climate research.
The HPC Lab also provides an important foundation for research projects and collaborations with companies. Industry partners can test new data-driven business models, develop prototypes, or improve existing processes using AI and simulation. This creates an environment in which knowledge is not only generated but also further developed collaboratively and directly applied in practice.
Learn more about the HPC Lab and the FHNW School of Computer Science here.
Source: FHNW

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