HPC Vendors Benefit from the World-Class Performance of PGI Compilers and Tools

PORTLAND, Ore., June 29 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- The Portland Group(TM), a wholly-owned subsidiary of STMicroelectronics, today unveiled a new plan designed specifically for independent software vendors (ISV's) active in high-performance computing (HPC). The PGI ISV Program delivers support for ISV's migrating applications to the new 64-bit computing platforms based on processors from AMD and Intel and running 64-bit Linux and Microsoft Windows operating systems. Viewed as a cost-effective opportunity to accelerate their 64-bit product offerings, several HPC vendors have joined the initiative including ANSYS, CD-Adapco, Gaussian, LSTC, and MSC.

"Once used predominantly by scientists and engineers, PGI compilers and tools are now being embraced by a wider market as the migration to 64-bit computing intensifies," said Douglas Miles, director, The Portland Group. "ISV's are choosing PGI compilers and tools for many of the same reasons scientists and engineers have: world-class performance, a complete and comprehensive suite of development tools and the only products that support both major computing platforms and both major 64-bit operating systems. Our ISV Program specifically addresses the needs and meets the challenges of these vendors as they migrate to 64-bit platforms."

PGI compilers and tools are used to create and run high-performance computing applications for complex modeling and simulations in weather forecasting, geophysical processing, aerodynamic simulation, structural analysis, automotive crash testing, computational chemistry, and related fields. These compilers and tools provide a uniformly optimized set of industry-tested development tools for the processors powering computing- intensive hardware platforms and are referenced regularly as the industry standard for performance and reliability.

"We chose PGI compilers and tools to port and optimize ANSYS(R), a desktop engineering simulation tool, to x64 architecture processors," said Mike Wheeler, vice president and general manager at ANSYS, Inc. "The leadership and support shown by the PGI team during our migration to 64-bit Linux platforms, along with the steady and ongoing performance enhancements delivered since that time, have contributed significantly to the success of our products. We look forward to sustaining this relationship as a member of the PGI ISV Program."

"CD-adapco, the leading provider of CAE flow simulation software and solutions, supports its STAR-CD suite on a wide range of platforms with a variety of compilers," said Dr. Mark Liu, manager in charge of product porting and optimization, CD-adapco. "CD-adapco has been working with The Portland Group in porting STAR-CD using the PGI compiler to 64bit Linux for Opteron and EM64T systems. The PGI compiler is robust and delivers good performance. STAR-CD's port with the PGI compiler has been available since mid-2004 and will continue to be available for upcoming releases. We appreciate the excellent work done by The Portland Group as a supplier of fully 64-bit capable compilers on Linux, and look forward to continuing to work with The Portland Group as a partner in the PGI ISV Program."

"ESI Group recently started working with The Portland Group to build versions of PAM-CRASH and PAM-STAMP for 64-bit Linux systems based on AMD processors. The responsive and extremely knowledgeable PGI applications engineering staff has helped us make significant progress on these platforms in a short period of time," said Raymond NI, CSM Solver director ESI Group. "Good compilers are critical to the success of ESI Group, and it has become clear that The Portland Group is a Linux compiler vendor we can rely on for the long term."

"We can count on the stability and reliability of the PGI compilers," said Michael Frisch, president, Gaussian, Inc. "Having a compiler with the same features and back-end across many computer platforms saves a great deal of developer time in producing correct and optimized code for each one. We have used PGI compilers and tools internally since 1998 to develop several major releases of GAUSSIAN on Linux and Windows platforms, and we look forward to a closer relationship with The Portland Group as a member of the PGI ISV Program."

"LSTC has been a user of PGI compilers and tools on x86 and x64 processor- based systems for several years. Due in part to our work with The Portland Group, the overall LS-DYNA performance on these systems has increased dramatically," said Dr. Jason Wang, senior software developer, Livermore Software Technology Corporation. "The opportunity to work directly with PGI applications and compiler teams in the future is the primary reason we've chosen to become a member of the PGI ISV Program."

"MSC builds the production version of MSC.MARC on both 32-bit and 64-bit Linux x86 platforms with PGI compilers. We've found the PGI compilers to be extremely easy to use, reliable, and performance-oriented," said Kevin Kilroy, director, Solvers Infrastructure, MSC.Software Corporation. "As a member of the PGI ISV Program, we look forward to further optimizing the performance of MSC.MARC on current and future generation x86-compatible processors."

The PGI Workstation suite includes the PGF77(R), PGF95(TM), PGCC(R), and PGC++(TM) compilers for the FORTRAN 77, Fortran 95, C, and C++ programming languages, respectively. All PGI compilers and tools feature full native support for OpenMP parallel programming extensions in Fortran, C, and C++; full support for 64-bit addressing; native integrated scalar and vector SSE/SSE2 code generation; and a bundled version of the ACML 2.5 library of highly optimized numeric functions for mathematical, engineering, scientific, and financial applications. PGI Workstation is highly optimized for both 32-bit and 64-bit AMD64 and EM64T processors. About the PGI ISV Program

The PGI ISV Program provides member companies with comprehensive support for the development, tuning and validation of commercial applications on AMD and Intel processor-based systems using PGI compilers and tools. Benefits include a dedicated technical contact at The Portland Group, cooperative pre- testing of application source code with upcoming releases of the PGI compilers, access to pre-release versions of the PGI compilers and tools, and support for application tuning across all platforms supported by the PGI compilers and tools. About The Portland Group

The Portland Group, a wholly-owned subsidiary of STMicroelectronics, is the premier supplier of high-performance Fortran, C, and C++ compilers and tools for high-end computing systems and X86 processor-based workstations, servers, and clusters. Further information on The Portland Group products can be found at http://www.pgroup.com , by calling Sales at (503) 682-2806, or by email to sales@pgroup.com. About STMicroelectronics

STMicroelectronics is a global leader in developing and delivering semiconductor solutions across the spectrum of microelectronics applications. An unrivalled combination of silicon and system expertise, manufacturing strength, Intellectual Property (IP) portfolio and strategic partners positions the Company at the forefront of System-on-Chip (SoC) technology and its products play a key role in enabling today's convergence markets. The Company's shares are traded on the New York Stock Exchange, on Euronext Paris and on the Milan Stock Exchange. In 2004, the Company's net revenues were $8.76 billion and net earnings were $601 million. Further information on ST can be found at http://www.st.com.

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