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Case study
Sauber F1 Team gains
competitive edge with
HP Compute
Accelerates critical design processing to perfect
aerodynamics for improved performance on
Formula One circuit
Industry
Motorsport
Objective
Increase computational fluid dynamics (CFD)
throughput to accelerate car designs for maximum
aerodynamic performance within strict industry
regulations that limit compute power utilization
Approach
Deploy HP Moonshot System with HP ProLiant
m350 Servers in the HP Moonshot 1500 Chassis to
run CFD solving jobs with bursting to HP ProLiant
SL230s Servers for urgent processing, along with
HP ProLiant BL460c Gen9 Servers to run pre- and
post-processing tasks.
IT matters
•Doubled throughput per teraflop to maximize CFD
calculations within industry regulations
•Enabled engineers to run twice as many design
loops using CFD to optimize aerodynamics
•Reduced energy use approximately 33% for
CFD jobs, lowering expenses and reducing
environmental impact
Business matters
•Help improve car performance at the racetrack,
strengthening the team’s competitive edge
•Save days of development time by filtering design
options to those most likely to succeed
•Reduce costs by optimizing designs before
proceeding to expensive wind tunnel tests
“Moonshot has almost doubled the throughput per teraflop
we had with our previous cluster. At the same time we’re
saving about 33% in energy for CFD jobs, which lowers
costs and reduces our environmental impact. Moonshot is
proving to be both resource-efficient and cost-efficient.”
–Magnus Frey, Head of IT, Sauber F1 Team
A leader in motorsport, Sauber F1 Team needed a more
efficient infrastructure to run critical computational fluid
dynamics (CFD) calculations, while meeting strict industry
regulations that limit compute power. By running core CFD
functions on the HP Moonshot System, Sauber doubled CFD
throughput within regulations while reducing energy
consumption 33%. This enables engineers to run more CFD
jobs to perfect designs and improve car performance at the
racetrack. Sauber also saves money by lowering IT operating
expenses and reducing the number of design options advanced
to expensive wind tunnel testing.
Case study | Sauber F1 Team
For Switzerland, Peter Sauber is a legend in
the world of auto racing. He founded Sauber
Motorsport in the 1970s and his team has
been competing in top-level events ever
since. Beginning 23 years ago, the Sauber
team advanced into Formula One (F1) racing,
competing in global Grand Prix competitions
from Monte Carlo, Barcelona, and Monza to
Melbourne, Singapore, and Kuala Lumpur.
In F1, performance is everything. But it’s not
just about raw horsepower—precision and
efficiency are what win races. That’s where
the Sauber F1 Team excels like no other in the
industry. They apply renowned Swiss precision
across an international group of mechanical
and engineering specialists. The team aims
to be very efficient in terms of utilizing its
human resources, allowing it compete at the
highest level as one of the private teams on the
grid. And now, since adopting the HP Moonshot
System, Sauber F1 Team has a highly efficient
IT infrastructure to run the highly complex
computational formulas that go into optimizing
the performance of its race cars.
Aerodynamics accounts for the majority of the
F1 car’s performance over which Sauber has
design control. To perfect the aerodynamics
of their cars, teams use computational fluid
dynamics (CFD) and wind tunnel tests to
solve airflow problems and develop further
aerodynamic improvements. Large race teams
may spend tens of millions of dollars on
research and development. Therefore, to allow
all teams to compete, the FIA (Fédération
Internationale de l’Automobile) imposes strict
regulations that limit peak compute power
teams can use for CFD jobs, measured in
teraflops (a trillion floating point operations
per second).
The challenge is to maximize CFD throughput
per teraflop. New FIA regulations pushed the
company to look for a more efficient solution.
Sauber considered a number of options,
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including traditional high-performance
computing (HPC) clusters. But the team
wanted more than just a new compute
system—it wanted a true technology partner.
Magnus Frey, Sauber’s head of IT, comments,
“We looked at many potential solutions, as well
as the companies behind those solutions. When
we engaged with HP, they got us thinking
outside the box to find the best performance
for our team. We found that HP provided a
really innovative and effective solution that
matched our needs precisely.”
Optimal performance and
efficiency for CFD
Unlike before when Sauber ran all aspects of
CFD processing on a single platform, the HP
solution divides workloads across multiple
platforms to optimize performance and
efficiency. HP Moonshot runs the “solving”
portion of the CFD process on HP ProLiant
m350 Servers with the Intel® Atom® Processor
C2750, each ProLiant m350 featuring four
servers. Using the Cluster Management Utility,
HP helped Sauber deploy this large number of
nodes in just 15 minutes.
Tomo Sato, head of CFD for the Sauber
F1 Team, notes, “We conducted extensive
benchmark testing using our real-world data
to simulate CFD jobs on HP Moonshot. The
results made it very clear that HP Moonshot
provided the best ratio of performance and
efficiency for us to maximize CFD throughput
within FIA teraflop limits.”
While the performance and efficiency of
HP Moonshot are optimal for everyday CFD
solving problems, sometimes Sauber faces an
urgent processing requirement. For example,
during a multi-day race event, the team may
receive feedback from the racetrack requiring
an overnight modification to the car’s design.
To maximize performance for these short
bursts of CFD processing while still controlling
Case study | Sauber F1 Team
teraflop consumption, Sauber F1 Team uses
HP ProLiant SL230s Servers with the Intel
Xeon® Processor E5-2660 v2.
In addition, CFD includes pre- and postprocessing workloads such as reporting
and analysis. This portion of CFD does not
fall under FIA regulations, freeing Sauber to
maximize compute power using HP ProLiant
BL460c Gen9 Servers with the Intel Xeon
Processor E5-2600. Sauber also uses the
ProLiant BL460c Gen9 servers for other
business applications such as running its race
strategy software during live F1 events and
performing lap-time simulations.
HP Financial Services provided Sauber with an
attractive financing package.
“While this is a large investment for Sauber
the package offered by HP Financial
Services made our decision easy,” Frey
remarks. “Partnership with a company like
HP is fantastic because they have so many
resources to get us the compute solutions we
need to perform successfully in the F1 circuit.”
Doubled CFD throughput to
perfect aerodynamics
Since moving CFD solving to HP Moonshot,
Sauber has accelerated CFD solving
performance dramatically while reducing
energy consumption and lowering costs.
“Moonshot has almost doubled the
throughput per teraflop we had with our
previous cluster,” reports Frey. “At the same
time, we’re saving about 33% in energy for
CFD jobs, which lowers costs and reduces our
environmental impact. Moonshot is proving to
be both resource-efficient and cost-efficient.”
This extra throughput means the Sauber F1
Team can perform more research to optimize
a car design before going into expensive wind
tunnel testing.
Tomo Sato explains, “CFD solving has always
been the biggest choke point in our design
workflow. By doubling throughput, Moonshot
enables us to run twice as many iterations
of CFD jobs to test different aerodynamic
configurations for things like cooling or rear
wing design. This allows us to narrow down
the options before spending money to build
components and send a car into the wind
tunnel. Ultimately, it saves us many days of
development time and helps improve car
performance at the racetrack so we compete
better.”
The flexible architecture of HP Moonshot also
enables Sauber to scale the CFD environment
quickly and replace nodes on the fly to
minimize any performance impact.
“If a server fails we can’t afford to wait a day or
two to deploy a replacement,” says Frey. “With
HP Moonshot, we can pop in a new server in
minutes. That’s key to maximizing utilization
of the system during critical development
times.”
Maximized resource
utilization with Operational
Support Services
To manage ongoing operation of the HP
Moonshot solution, Sauber evaluated
several options for datacenter housing and
operational support. After analyzing Sauber’s
objectives and service requirements, HP
Technology Services proposed a distinct
approach for both areas: HP to take on
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Case study | Sauber F1 Team
Customer at a glance
Hardware
•HP ProLiant m350 Servers
•HP Moonshot 1500 Chassis
•HP ProLiant SL230s Servers
•HP ProLiant BL460c Gen9 Servers
Software
•CentOS Linux operating environment
•Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software
package
•Race strategy software
•Lap-time simulation
HP Services
•HP Technology Services
•HP Datacenter Care Operational Support
Services (OSS)
•HP Financial Services
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responsibility for the on-going operation of
the HP Moonshot System and to house it at
Sauber F1 team’s own location in Hinwil.
As a result, HP Datacenter Care and
Operational Support Services now cover
the operation of the HP Moonshot solution
running Sauber’s critical CFD environment at
their own premises. The overall solution has
been designed to satisfy Sauber’s technical,
organizational and commercial objectives. The
value of HP’s services has already become
clear in the first months of operation, with HP
Technology Services maintaining the platform
that runs at over 95% system utilization, 365
days a year.
Race day simulations
improve competitive edge
Sauber is gaining value beyond CFD processing
thanks to HP ProLiant BL460c Gen9 Servers.
By using the ProLiant BL460c Gen9 servers to
run race strategy optimizations and lap-time
simulations, the Sauber F1 Team can further
improve race-day performance.
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Frey remarks, “The ProLiant BL460c Gen9
Servers allow us to use a smaller number of
nodes to conduct more simulations before
and during a race. Faster heavy-duty number
crunching means we can react intelligently to
race events as they unfold. It’s one more way
to gain a competitive edge on the track.”
Sauber is so satisfied with the HP solution for
CFD processing and other applications that the
team is now discussing other ways to leverage
HP technology. For example, the company
is considering an HP Moonshot solution to
replace two massive server racks that are
hauled to every F1 track to support the race
crew. The dense, efficient HP Moonshot
System would save valuable space, accelerate
setup, and reduce operating costs.
“Our partnership with HP continues to grow in
value,” Frey concludes. “HP is always willing
to spend time understanding our special
industry needs and coming up with innovative
solutions. That’s a great formula for longterm success.”
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4AA5-8650ENW, May 2015