Abstract
Summary form only given. Over that last 3 decades, we have witnessed a transition from closed software ecosystems being the foundation for HPC, enterprise, and business to open source software ecosystems based on Linux: from Arduino in the IoT space, to Android in the mobile space to Linux in HPC and cloud-based systems with various Open Source Software projects built on top. However, when examining hardware, current commercial off the shelf solutions are closed hardware ecosystems that only enable integration at the peripheral (PCIe) level. The combination of current technology trends, the slowing of Moore’s Law, and cost prohibitive silicon manufacturing inhibit significant power-performance gains by relying on traditional closed ecosystems, especially in HPC, technology pushed to the extreme. This new regime forces systems to be much more specialized to achieve the power-performance profiles required for a supercomputer. In the past, HPC has led the way forward, defining the bleeding edge of technology. HPC can do this again with open hardware, as it has done in software with adopting Linux and open source in general. This is not only a technology imperative, but one born out of current geopolitics.