EU Orders Supercomputer from Bull

The European Union has officially awarded Bull a €387.8 million contract to construct a new supercomputer specifically designed for AI workloads. This agreement represents the largest single order in the history of the French state-owned company, highlighting its growing role in the region's technical infrastructure.

The supercomputing body EuroHPC selected Bull to develop LUMI-AI, which marks the sixth system commissioned under its strategic AI Factories program. This new machine is scheduled to be installed alongside the existing LUMI supercomputer in Finland and is expected to be fully operational by the second half of 2027. Backed by a substantial €8.2 billion budget through 2027, the organization has already established 19 AI Factories around 12 supercomputers and is planning for further network expansion.

"Right now, we have to reject some applications because we cannot satisfy all these demands," said Evangelos Floros, EuroHPC infrastructure executive. He noted that these capacity constraints should begin to ease as additional systems are brought online starting late this year. Floros added that the network has ⁠become the EU's leading platform for advancing AI.

In terms of technical integration, Bull will utilize AI chips from AMD, storage solutions from IBM, and networking technology provided by Nokia. EuroHPC’s systems are already being utilized by prominent European AI developers; for instance, OVHcloud has finished the initial training phase of a foundation model on Germany's Jupiter supercomputer, while the Italian startup Domyn is leveraging EuroHPC infrastructure to train its own proprietary model.