• H2020
• Industrial Leadership
• ICT

The dRedBox consortium has been awarded €6.4m in EU funding under Horizon 2020 to develop a next-generation cloud computing server.

The new dRedBox design aims to speed up memory access using fibre-optic connections while lowering electric power consumption by up to 20%. It is expected to lead to faster processing, better resource allocation and overall lower costs.

Data centres in Ireland currently use 7% (414MW) of all electricity generated, a figure which is set to more than double by 2020. A 20% reduction in data centres’ electricity consumption would have an environmental benefit equal to removing 150,000 cars from Irish roads.

“Kinesense is delighted to be part of shaping the future of the Cloud,” said Dr Mark Sugrue, chief technology officer at the Irish-based company, which is part of the consortium.

“Our role is to develop our video investigation solutions on the new dRedBox system and prove its efficiency. [What] this means for our customers is faster servers and lower running costs. Access to the right information at the right time is paramount for police, especially in today’s world,” he added.

The dRedBox consortium is led by IBM Research, Ireland, and comprises, in addition to Kinesense, a number of prominent R&D organisations, including Telefonica,  Barcelona Supercomputing Center and naudit, Spain; the University of Thessaly and Foundation for Research and Technology, Greece; the University of Bristol, UK; Sintecs, the Netherlands; and Virtual Open Systems, France.

The project will run for three years.