SC15 at Austin – Another Successful SC Conference!

Me introducing the SC15 invited plenary speakers — Photo by SC15

Wow! What a conference! SC15, the 27th international conference of high performance computing, networking, storage and analysis, from November 15 to 20, 2016 in Austin, Texas, again broke all records and with 12, 862 registered attendees from 65 countries is now officially the largest SC conference ever. There were 4830 people attending the technical program. It featured 78 technical paper presentations, 15 invited speakers, 41 tutorials, 42 workshops, 123 posters, 75 BoFs, and 12 panels. In parallel to the technical program, the attached exhibit hall featured 343 exhibitors from industry, academia and research organizations from around the world in approx. 137,000 net square feet of exhibit space, again the largest of all SC conferences. It certainly sets a high bar for me looking forward to 2017!

SC15 Technical Program Networking Event in Austin Football Stadium – Photo by Bernd Mohr

So where do have the customary technical program social event during the conference when you have over 4000 people coming? Answer: at the University of Texas at Austin football stadium! The food court was easily able to handle this crowd. 😉

Also, as a leading high-tech IT conference, attendees expect the latest and best networking support. So, during the conference, Austin also became the hub for the world’s fastest conference computer network – SCinet – which made 1.63 TeraBits of bandwidth available to exhibitors and attendees.  The network featured 89 miles of fiber deployed throughout the convention center and was constructed and maintained by 130 volunteers from 15 countries using US$22 million in loaned equipment. 337 wireless access points provided excellent service to about 6000 concurrent wireless clients roaming the Austin convention center during the conference.

But after the conference is before the conference! Let’s get SC16 organized in Salt Lake City!