Computing skills will take SA into digital revolution

SOUTH AFRICA has been urged to invest in the development of a skilled high-performance computing generation, to avoid missing out on the opportunities of the Fourth Industrial Revolution (FIR).

Addressing delegates at the annual conference of the Centre for High Performance Computing (CHPC) in Cape Town this week, the department’s director-general Dr Phil Mjwara, said the core of the Fourth Industrial Revolution was the emergence of cyber-physical systems, based upon the country’s ability to collect massive amounts of data, manipulate and analyse them efficiently, and transfer them fast and securely.

Quantum technologies have the potential to realise this vision, and drive breakthroughs in many sectors, providing speedy results in health, weather and transport, among other areas. Quantum computing functions differently from conventional computing, harnessing the speed and behaviour of atoms to perform seemingly impossible calculations.

However, scientists worldwide have yet to reach a point at which a quantum computer beats a conventional computer on any commission. Mjwara said South Africa was at the forefront of the development of the first real-life implementations of quantum cryptography, and was now spearheading the field of quantum machine learning.

Mjwara said South Africa needed to create a workforce for the machine age, build trust in the digital economy and encourage a paradigm shift in industry.

“To exploit the opportunities of the digital transformation, companies will be forced to rethink and innovate their production processes.”

South Africa has made significant investment in cyberinfrastructure over the past 10 years. The establishment of the National Integrated Cyberinfrastructure System, managed by the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, was central to this investment. Its pillars are the Data Intensive Research Initiative of South Africa, the South African National Research Network and the CHPC.

With the successful uptake of cyberinfrastructure in many African countries, said CHPC director Dr Happy Sithole, the debate is now about how to make the most of the facilities. Projects in Africa such as the development of radio astronomy, solving health problems through bioinformatics, understanding climate change, and preparing for the FIR will rely heavily on big data processing.