HP and Microsoft have agreed to continue cooperating on plans to take supercomputing to the mass enterprise and mid-sized markets.

The multimillion dollar deal means Microsoft's Compute Cluster Server (CCS) 2003 will be available on HP servers both direct and through the channel as part of its Unified Cluster Portfolio, supported on ProLiant, BladeSystem and Cluster platforms.

The firms say the sector is set for continuing healthy growth, quoting IDC program vice-president Earl Joseph in their announcement. The past four years have seen annual increases of over 20 per cent, Joseph says.

"End-users are looking for easy-to-use systems and will likely go with vendors that can provide an easy transition from their desktops to HPC servers," Jospeh adds. Familiarity with the Windows system, particularly among desktop users, is seen as the big selling point of the alliance.

The two companies have set up benchmarking and application testing venues in France and the US that will be made available to independent software vendors and customers alike. ®