How banks can achieve high-performance computing on AWS

How banks can achieve high-performance computing on AWS using the four critical components :

1.Data Transfer

Efficient data transfer mechanisms are critical to move large amounts of data quickly and securely:

-AWS Snowmobile or Snowball: Ideal for transferring terabytes or petabytes of data for migrations or backups. These physical devices are especially useful for large-scale data movements into AWS.

-AWS DataSync: Automates moving data between on-premises storage and AWS (S3, EFS, FSx) seamlessly, reducing time and complexity.

-AWS Direct Connect: Provides dedicated network connections to AWS data centers, ensuring secure and low-latency data transfer, critical for performance and reducing operational costs.

2.Compute & Networking

AWS provides a variety of compute and networking options tailored for high-performance workloads in banking:

- EC2 Instances (GPU or CPU optimized) : These instances can be optimized for various types of HPC tasks, with specific instance types designed for compute-intensive (e.g., C5) or GPU-based workloads (e.g., P4 instances for machine learning).

- EC2 Fleets (Spot Instances) : Allows banks to run HPC workloads at a reduced cost by using spot instances, which are often more cost-effective for distributed processing jobs.

- Placement Groups : Ensures low-latency, high-bandwidth communication between EC2 instances through Clustered Placement Groups, which physically place instances close to each other.

- Enhanced Networking : Increases packet per second (PPS) performance and reduces latency and jitter using Enhanced Networking technologies like Elastic Network Adapter (ENA).

- Elastic Network Adapters (ENA) and Elastic Fabric Adapters (EFA) : Offer high-performance, low-latency networking for HPC workloads, particularly for workloads that need inter-node communication, such as financial modeling or risk simulations.

3. Storage

Different types of storage systems to meet various performance and scalability needs:

3.1 Instance-Attached Storage :

EBS (Elastic Block Store): Delivers up to 64,000 IOPS with Provisioned IOPS for transactional banking applications needing high throughput.

Instance Store : Provides temporary storage with ultra-low latency and millions of IOPS for high-speed, ephemeral storage needs.

3.2 Network-Attached Storage :

Amazon S3 : Highly scalable, distributed object storage perfect for storing large datasets with high availability.

Amazon EFS (Elastic File System): Auto-scaling file storage that adjusts IOPS based on file size and supports shared file systems.

Amazon FSx for Lustre : HPC-optimized distributed file system that scales up to millions of IOPS and is purpose-built for high-performance computing workloads in finance, such as analytics or high-frequency trading.

4. Orchestration and Automation

AWS provides powerful tools to manage and automate HPC environments:

-AWS Batch : Automates the scheduling and execution of HPC workloads, dynamically provisioning and scaling EC2 resources as needed.

- AWS ParallelCluster : Simplifies the deployment and management of HPC clusters, allowing seamless scaling and orchestration of jobs across EC2 instances, while also optimizing costs and performance.

This combination of AWS services provides financial institutions with the agility, scalability, and performance required for HPC applications like risk management, fraud detection, financial modeling, and more.