Publicly listed technology and analytical software developer DUG Technology (ASX:DUG) has executed a financial assistance agreement to receive $5 million in grant funding from the Western Australian State Government.

The company, which has a $163.01 million market capitalisation, says the funds will have been secured as part of the government’s Investment Attraction Fund, and will be used for the first data hall of its Geraldton High Performance Computing Campus.

DUG reports funds will be disbursed over a 2-year period in accordance with agreed milestones.

“This project has the potential to be transformational for the business and for WA in data processing and storage”

This data hall is expected to have a capacity of 400 petaflops of compute, enabling a 13-fold growth in its compute power once fully established. As a result, this would place the facility amongst the largest supercomputers in the world.

DUG notes the initial spend will be focused on construction of the first data hall and connected infrastructure, with the grant funding up to half of these costs.

Remaining costs are expected to be fulfilled by the company through existing funds, as well as cash from operations.

Following this announcement, DUG Technology announces it will move forward with signing a lease for 44.5 hectares of land for the construction of the campus, as well as any associated infrastructure. The company has also expressed its intention to develop onsite sustainable energy solutions.

DUG adds it will deploy its patented, immersion cooling solution, DUG Cool, as it enables it to build cost-effective and highly energy-efficient data centres due to it reducing power consumption by more than 50%.

Addressing the funding, DUG Technology Managing Director Matt Lamont said: “This project has the potential to be transformational for the business and for WA in data processing and storage. We have been committed to this project since 2021 and have been working through project funding solutions and groundworks required to the site.

Geraldton is an ideal location for this campus with ready access to renewable power from wind and solar and a large physical space for expansion. The latency from Geraldton to Perth is just 3 milliseconds, hence the user experience will be near identical to working with the existing West Perth data centre. Fibre links from Geraldton to Singapore open new market opportunities.

Importantly, the project has the support of the Yamatji Southern Regional Corporation Ltd board. DUG will partner with the Yamatji Nation People to provide a range of regional employment opportunities to the Geraldton community.

We are grateful to the WA State Government for their support, which I expect will pay dividends by creating jobs and placing WA on the global supercomputing map.”

DUG Technology is a technology developer headquartered in Australia that specialises in analytical software development and reliable, green, high-performance computing (HPC). The company is built on a ‘strong’ foundation of applied science, as well as a history of converting research into practical, real-world solutions.

With offices in Perth, London, Houston, and Kuala Lumpur, the company is positioned to support a diverse industrial client-base that includes radio-astronomy, biomedicine, and meteorology, as well as the resource, government and education sectors.

DUG Technology had US$5.5 million cash at hand with net cash of US$2.1 million as at 31 March 2023, as stated in its latest quarterly report.