Falcon Launch Marks the Next Phase of Research Computing at Cardiff University
17 March 2026
Cardiff University has officially launched Falcon, its newest High Performance Computing (HPC) system, delivering a major leap forward for the University’s research computing capabilities.
Introduced last month, Falcon replaces the long‑serving Hawk cluster and provides a substantial increase in power, efficiency and scalability for researchers across the University, as well as Supercomputing Wales (SCW) colleagues at Bangor University.
Hosted in a modern co‑location data centre outside Cardiff, Falcon brings together over 10,000 CPU cores, a suite of advanced GPU accelerators, and high‑performance storage to support cutting‑edge work across a broad range of disciplines. Researchers in computational modelling, engineering, biosciences, artificial intelligence, genomics and the digital humanities will all benefit from the system’s enhanced speed and capacity.
Early benchmarking shows that many research applications run four to five times faster on Falcon compared with Hawk. This uplift enables larger simulations, faster data processing and significantly shorter turnaround times - accelerating research workflows across the University.
Falcon combines powerful AMD Genoa processors with next‑generation GPU technologies including NVIDIA H200, H100 and L40S GPUs. These components are supported by DDN parallelLustre storage and a high‑bandwidth NVIDIA (Mellanox) HDR InfiniBand network, providing rapid communication between nodes to support demanding workloads such as deep learning, data‑intensive modelling and large‑scale parallel computation.
Falcon represents a major investment in the University’s digital research infrastructure. It dramatically expands what our researchers can achieve whether they are modelling astrophysical processes, training AI models or analysing high volume biomedical datasets
Sustainability is a central feature of the new system. Falcon uses Direct Liquid Cooling (DLC), a highly energy‑efficient method that significantly reduces electricity consumption compared with traditional air‑cooled systems. Over its first five years, Falcon is expected to deliver major reductions in power usage and operational costs, supporting Cardiff University’s broader environmental commitments.
The launch of Falcon also marks the beginning of the next phase of development for the University’s research computing ecosystem. This spring, ARCCA will begin commissioning new research data services aligned with the FAIR data principles (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reproducible). The new FAIR Campus service will introduce a comprehensive Research Data Management (RDM) offering, a disk‑based Research Data Store (RDS) for active data, and a Research Data Archive (RDA) for long‑term preservation. Migration of existing research data will take place across late spring and summer, with full service availability for new project requirements scheduled for September 2026.