Aongus Lawlor and Brian McNamee

Insight leads project to bring ‘single biggest investment in AI supercomputing’ to UCD

Submitted on Thursday, 06/11/2025

University College Dublin has announced it is is procuring a new €724,000 Nvidia supercomputer to accelerate AI-powered research on the campus and allow students from across fields to access the high-end technology.

Called Advanced UCD Research in Artificial Intelligence (AURA), the supercomputer project – representing the single biggest investment in AI supercomputing by the university – is funded through the Higher Education Research Equipment Grant.

The project is led by Insight’s Dr Aonghus Lawlor and Professor Brian Mac Namee.

Project co-principal investigator Dr Brian Mac Namee, who is also the site director at the Insight Research Ireland Centre for Data Analytics, talks to Silicon Republic about this exciting new development for the Irish AI ecosystem. The article also has inputs from Insight investigators Professor Gerardine Meaney and Professor Andrew Hines.

UCD buys €724,000 Nvidia supercomputer for AI-led research boost