1. XSEDE Value Added and Financial Economies
NSF Review
September 17, 2014

2. Question
Is the organization of XSEDE effective and financially beneficial as a way to deliver cyberinfrastructure services to the US (open) research community? ?
Center 2
Center 1
Center 3
Center 4
Center 2
Center 1
Center 3
Center 4 X S E D
vs.

3. The purpose of this presentation is to support this assertion
As compared to a system in which multiple centers deliver cyberinfrastructure services to the national research community, XSEDE, as a single, cooperative national service:
adds value that would not otherwise occur;
achieves financial economies in delivering service to the nation
The purpose of this presentation is to support this assertion

4. Scope Topic Scope Value Added Includes benefits of:
User productivity (Single sign-on , allocation processes)
Advanced support – disciplinary breadth and depth
National leadership function
Training, Education, Outreach – national scope
Financial economies
Considers costs of:
User support
Essential operations: security, disaster resilience
Core service infrastructure
7 x 24 operations, basic infrastructure
Documentation

5. Two main categories of value added:
XSEDE Value Added
Benefits that accrue from having one coordinated and consolidated organization that would not happen in a scenario of multiple organizations.
Two main categories of value added:
value that results from there being a single entity serving the national research community and providing leadership with which other projects can align
value that results from the scale of XSEDE

6. Discussed by Ralph Roskies in a different context
Benefits of a Single Coordinating Organization – Uniformity of Computing Environment Improves User Productivity
Discussed by Ralph Roskies in a different context
Single web interface overall
Single allocation process
Coordinated help desk support
Same look and feel of documentation at all sites
Unified authentication mechanism
Unified set of tools for data management
Expert help in selecting the right resource from the entire array of nationally-available resources of XD program

7. Benefits of a Single Coordinating Organization – Security Effectiveness
One unified security team has proved highly effective in responding to security incidents.
Under XSEDE there have been no incidents that propagated from one center to another within XSEDE.
Under TeraGrid there were two security incidents that propagated to multiple centers.

8. Benefits of a Single Coordinating Organization – Disaster Resilience
Critical core services are offered by XSEDE in a way that provides resilience even in the face of a regional disaster.
Key core services such as authentication and ticket system are operated in one geographic region of the US and have backup in a different region.
Failover to secondary services exercised regularly, has been used in practice.

9. Quality Software Infrastructure for overall service
Benefits of a Single Coordinating Organization – Software Optimization and Support
Quality Software Infrastructure for overall service
XSEDE engineering process hardens & vets software
Optimization Of Widely Used Community Codes
prioritizing and coordinating effort
often optimized for multiple architectures
continuity of domain support as architectures change, enabled by application experts who know codes and participate as staff in XSEDE for periods
improving code substantially is as better than buying more hardware

10. Benefits of a Single Coordinating Organization & Scale – One Resource With Which the Nation Can Align
Several science projects use XSEDE as a resource
more than 40 Letters of Support written, LIGO, National Center for Genome Analysis Support
Science Gateways – one national cyberinfrastructure environment to serve as a back end for gateways
Campus Bridging
aligns national CI – single entity to bridge to
enables the national research community to better leverage non-federal investments in campus CI
extends the value of software created by community through XCBC
XSEDE becomes a coordinating point for national and international entities who want to engage the NSF HPC programs.

11. Benefits From Scale – Scale of Staff Overall
Discussed by Ralph Roskies in a different context
Disciplinary Breadth of Expertise, allows coverage of domains composed of diverse sub-domains that 2 or 4 centers could not cover
Novel and Innovative Projects
support of emerging & innovative research
breadth of disciplines & approaches leveraged
one team vs. multiple competing teams
there is some cost to coordination within XSEDE as compared to a single center in one location.

12. Benefits From Scale – TEOS National impact
Training & Education programs, Underrepresented Community Engagement of national scope
Student programs serve a more diverse group of students due to national scope
Better ability to cover the entire nation in outreach:
XSEDE Conference
Users in all 50 states, D.C., and US territories
Campus Champions - 49 States
XSEDE staff physically located in 18 states + DC
One consistent message and set of technical information makes it easier for technology adoption to spread organically
Broader Participation among institutions
~15% of XSEDE’s budget goes to the 14 institutions other than the 5 institutions represented by PI & Co-PIs

13. Measuring Financial Benefits of XSEDE As One Organization
Committed fixed costs* are the essential costs of operating an enterprise
Cost avoidance* is the difference in cost between doing something one way as opposed to some other, hypothetical way
We calculated cost avoidance of one national integrating function as compared to hypothetical scenarios of 2 or 4 by comparing XSEDE actual costs for core functions vs. the committed fixed cost minimum for a 2-center and 4-center model
*Definitions from Kinney & Raiborn Cost accounting. South-Western. 832 pp.

14. Committed Fixed Costs Per National Center
Activity
Fewest FTEs Needed /Center
Per Center Non personnel Cost
Per Center Personnel Cost
Allocations
1.25
$100,000
$250,000
A & AM
Authentication Services
1.50
$300,000
24 x 7 Operations
5.00
$1,000,000
Ticket Support
User Survey
0.50
Leadership
3.00
$600,000
Project Managers & Finance
1.00
$15,000
$200,000
User Information Services
$20,000
Training
2.00
$400,000
Education
Outreach
Network
Central Services (web portal, etc.)
Systems Engineering & Deployment
4.00
$800,000
Subtotals 34
$405,000
$6,800,000
Advanced computing support [Scales with nation – 24 total needed to cover national community] 24
$4,800,000
MINIMUM FIXED COST 58
$12,005,000

15. XSEDE Committed Fixed Costs (Actual Costs for Essential Core Functions)
Activity
XSEDE FTEs
Non- personnel Costs
XSEDE personnel costs
Allocations
2.25
$100,000
$450,000
A & AM
2.50
$500,000
Authentication Services
4.30
$860,000
24 x 7 Operations
5.00
$1,000,000
Ticket Support
2.00
$400,000
User Survey
1.25
$250,000
Project Management
Leadership and Project Management
3.50
$700,000
Project Managers & Finance
$30,000
User Information Services
6.00
$20,000
$1,200,000
Training
7.50
$1,500,000
Education
Outreach
Network
Central Services (web portal, etc.)
Systems Engineering & Deployment
7.00
$1,400,000
Advanced Computing Support
24.00
$4,800,000
Subtotals
$420,000
$17,460,000
XSEDE ANNUAL COST
87.3
$17,880,000

16. Cost Avoidance Analysis Results
Cost Avoidance as compared to 2-center Model
$1,330,000 in cost avoidance (financial economies) per year
Calculated in a very conservative way because significant funding goes to provide high quality rather than minimal services
Cost Avoidance as compared to 4-center Model
$15,740,000 in cost avoidance (financial economies) per year

17. Sanity Test Activity Annual Budget for Operations
XSEDE committed fixed costs
$17,880,000
XSEDE total budget
$24,200,000
XD Program Track II Operations as of FY2015 (calculated at 20% of acquisition cost per year)
$14,860,000
Total XSEDE committed fixed costs + Track II O&M
$32,740,000
Total XSEDE total budget + Track II O&M
$39,060,000
Blue Waters
$30,000,000

18. Concluding Remarks
There is significant added value to having one organization cooperating to operate a national interface for NSF-funded CI
some of these added value benefits come from the simple fact that one national organizing function
some of the added value comes from the scale of XSEDE
XSEDE achieves significant cost avoidance
that is, XSEDE saves the federal government money on critical core functions as compared to alternate models for serving the national open research community
The analysis has changed considerably since the version included in the review materials. A new written version of the analysis incorporating any responses to your suggestions will be provided to you tomorrow.
We are planning to submit this analysis as a paper to the American Society for Quality technical conference or similar venue. Do you have any suggestions about the analysis (or alternate suggestions on a venue)?