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NVIDIA Partners UF to Build AI-Based Academic Supercomputer

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NVIDIA Corp. (NVDA - Free Report) is collaborating with the University of Florida (UF) to build a powerful artificial intelligence (AI)-based supercomputer for the academic world.

Notably, NVIDIA co-founder, Chris Malachowsky, who also happens to be an alumnus of the UF, gifted $25 million for the project. Also, hardware, software, training and services worth $25 million was contributed to the project by NVIDIA. Apart from this, the UF will also invest an additional $20 million in the development of the supercomputer, making the entire project worth $70 million.

The news comes shortly after the UF became the first academic institution in the United States to receive NVIDIA's DGX A100 data center computing unit, which will be used to enhance the current supercomputer used by the UF — HiPerGator. The supercomputer is expected to be functional by early 2021.

Markedly, the supercomputer will enable faculty and students everywhere to use AI to address major national environmental and social challenges, such as rising water levels of seas, aging populations, data security, urban transportation, food insecurity and others. The UF expects that if used efficiently, the project will help churn out as many as 30,000 AI-expert graduates by 2030.

Additionally, the supercomputer will help develop a research landscape to find solutions to curb the coronavirus pandemic.

The University has decided to hire 100 academic staff for AI and related fields, in addition to 500 recently hired faculty, who will incorporate AI into various fields of study.

NVIDIA’s aggressive initiatives in AI will aid growth in the near future, given the accelerated adoption of the technology. Per Grand View Research, the global artificial intelligence market is expected to witness a CAGR of 42.2% from 2020-2027.

In November last year, NVIDIA rolled out “a new kind of” Microsoft (MSFT - Free Report) Azure-based GPU-accelerated supercomputer, to accelerate conversational AI modeling, ML and deep learning applications, and large-scale simulations, among others, by utilizing multiple NDv2 instances.

The incorporation of AI technologies into industries like construction, manufacturing, agriculture and logistics will ease the way of working in these industries, which otherwise require significant human labor.

NVIDIA, backed by the multi-industrial adoption of its AI technologies, is anticipated to gain from the massive growth opportunity in the market, which will eventually be beneficial for its top line.

Zacks Rank and Stocks to Consider

NVIDIA currently has a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).

A few better-ranked stocks in the broader technology sector are Dropbox, Inc. (DBX - Free Report) and Asure Software Inc. (ASUR - Free Report) . Both companies currently sport a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

Long-term earnings growth rate for Dropbox and Asure is currently pegged at 32.51% and 14%, respectively.

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