Top 500 supercomputers race, 1993 to...

The New York Times reported today that "U.S. Retakes Top Spot in Supercomputer Race" with the first exaflop computer, capable of greater than 10^18 floating point operations per second. The story's source is Top500.org which tracks the world's 500 fastest computers.

The fastest computer is just one world record that has changed back and forth over the years. A more interesting story is which countries have made the top 500 supercomputers. Take a look at this video which shows the race from 1993 to 2019.

Since 1993, these computers predominately resided in five countries: USA, Japan, Germany, France and UK. The country ranking from 2nd to 4th spot varies back and forth, with USA always leading at the top spot. In 2003, China enters the top 10, then climbs to the top 5 in 2004. Then watch the race from 2013 to 2019.

I find this video is as compelling as watching runners in a marathon!

The point of sharing this exhibit is that it is just one minor signal in how the world order in technology has been changing. From commercial semiconductors, to pharmaceuticals, to fine and specialty chemicals, to strategic minerals, to energy, the order that has prevailed from post-World War 2 to the end of the age of hyper-globalization is now changing, with implications to anyone starting a career in any of these fields.