China targets top spot in supercomputing with fully domestic machine

China has unveiled a new supercomputer built from entirely home-grown CPUs, with the aim of beating the world’s fastest machine while sidestepping US export controls. Known as Lingsheng or LineShine, it is designed to reach 2 exaflops – or two quintillion calculations per second – edging past the 1.8-exaflop El Capitan, the current record holder at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California. Unlike other exascale supercomputers, which rely on graphics processing units (GPUs),...

By Ling Xin