An additional €165 million is needed annually to keep the Dutch digital infrastructure for research up to date. This is according to research funder NWO and ICT cooperative SURF. If this does not happen, Dutch science will quickly fall behind.
Over the past ten years, the computing power of Dutch supercomputers and digital networks has lagged far behind that of other countries. In a European supercomputing ranking, the Netherlands dropped from seventh to twentieth place.
Relocating to other countries
Researchers who are increasingly working with large data sets are therefore having to turn to countries such as Finland and France, according to an inventory (Dutch PDF) by NWO and the ICT cooperative of Dutch education and research.
‘Without a digital foundation, our knowledge economy is in jeopardy,’ they write. ‘Digital infrastructures are often invisible, but absolutely indispensable.’
According to the organisations, the additional €165 million is needed for national and local computing facilities, data storage and network infrastructure, digital security and connections to European computing and AI facilities, among other things. (HOP/HC)
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