Its data-processing capacity is equal to around 5000 personal computers, and by the end of next year it will form the backbone of a supercomputer system that will be among the 40 most powerful in the world.

At the opening ceremony, Slovenian Prime Minister Marjan Šarec stated that the event is of major importance for the entire Eastern cohesion region, and also for Maribor, which is entering the new era with great strides. “Today we are witness to the symbolic startup of the Maister project, which will be followed by the booting up of the Vega computer, which means that development is proceeding at a great pace, and the government and everyone who is contributing to the project in any way will continue to strive to make Maribor a leader in the research and development field, which will also be made possible by these computers.”

The prototype supercomputer, which bears the working name Maister and is located in the atrium of the technical faculties in the centre of Maribor, is designed to develop and test systems and software solutions that will serve as the basis for the construction of the primary supercomputer system at the Institute of Information Science (IZUM).

The Maister computer has a capacity of up to 244 TeraFLOPS, which according to the Deputy Dean of the University of Maribor Miralem Hadžiselimović is like having 31,688 planet Earths with 7.7 billion people all computing at the same time. “But the primary computer will have 50 times more capacity,” he explained.

The system will be the most powerful public supercomputer in Slovenia – following the principle of open access public research infrastructure it will be available to all public research organisations in the country, as well as to businesses.