Article 17 Allocation of Union’s access time to the EuroHPC supercomputers

The share of the Union’s access time to each high-end, quantum and AI-optimised EuroHPC supercomputer shall be directly proportional to the financial contribution of the Union referred to in Article 5(1) to the total cost of ownership of the EuroHPC supercomputer and shall thus not exceed 50 % of the total access time of the EuroHPC supercomputer.

The share of the Union’s access time to each mid-range EuroHPC supercomputer shall be directly proportional to the financial contribution of the Union, referred to in Article 5(1), to the acquisition and operating cost of the supercomputer and shall not exceed 35 % of the total access time of the supercomputer.

The share of the Union’s access time to each industrial-grade EuroHPC supercomputer shall be directly proportional to the financial contribution of the Union, referred to in Article 5(1), to the acquisition cost of the supercomputer and shall not exceed 35 % of the total access time of the supercomputer.

Each Participating State where a hosting entity is established or each Participating State in a hosting consortium shall be allocated the remaining access time to each EuroHPC supercomputer. In the case of a hosting consortium, the Participating States shall agree among themselves the distribution of access time to the supercomputer.

The Governing Board shall define the access rights to the Union’s share of access time to the EuroHPC supercomputers.

Use of the Union’s share of access time to the EuroHPC supercomputers shall be free of charge for the users from the public sector referred to in Article 16(4). It shall also be free of charge for industrial users for applications related to research and innovation activities funded by Horizon Europe or the Digital Europe Programme as well as those awarded a Seal of Excellence under Horizon Europe or the Digital Europe Programme and for private innovation activities of SMEs, where appropriate. As a guiding principle, allocation of access time for such activities shall be based on a fair and transparent peer review process defined by the Governing Board following continuously open calls for expression of interest launched by the Joint Undertaking.

With the exception of SME users undertaking private innovation activities, other users shall adopt an open science approach to disseminating knowledge gained through access to the supercomputers of the Joint Undertaking, in accordance with Article 14 of Regulation (EU) 2021/695. The Governing Board shall define further the applicable open science rules.

The Governing Board shall define specific rules for access conditions that depart from the guiding principles referred to in paragraph 6. These concern the allocation of access time for projects and activities considered as strategic for the Union.

Upon request of the Union, the Executive Director shall grant direct access to the EuroHPC supercomputers to initiatives that the Union considers essential for providing health- or climate-related or other crucial emergency support services for the public good, to emergency and crisis management situations or to cases that the Union considers essential for its security and defence. The modalities and conditions for the implementation of such access shall be defined in the access conditions adopted by the Governing Board.

The Governing Board shall define the conditions that apply for industrial use to provide access to the Union’s share of access time to secure High Performance Computing and data resources for applications other than those specified in paragraph 6.

The Governing Board shall regularly monitor the Union’s share of access time granted per Participating State and per user category, including for commercial purposes. It may decide among others to: