Development of a Capability Assessment Model for Korea’s National HPC Centers

Recognizing the strategic importance of domain-specific high-performance computing (HPC), Korea designated six specialized national centers in 2023, with plans to expand this number to ten by 2030. To ensure effective operation and governance, a capability assessment providing a current and comparable view of these centers is essential. This study proposes a policy-linked framework for assessing the capabilities of Korea’s national HPC centers. The assessment model is organized into six categories: Foundation, Input, Process, Output, Outcome, and Policy Alignment, with a set of representative indicators specified for each category. These indicators were developed through an inductive analysis of relevant literature to identify key measures, along with a deductive integration of attributes specific to centers with statutory policy mandates. Each indicator is normalized against field-specific targets, and category-level and within-category weights are determined using the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) to produce a single composite capability score for each center.