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Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) has selected NVIDIA’s Vera Rubin platform, Vera CPUs and Quantum-X800 InfiniBand for three HPE-built supercomputers named Mission, Vision and Veritas. The systems are planned for national-security work, open science and technology experimentation, respectively. However, the reviewed official announcements do not confirm that the first Vera test server actually arrived at LANL; the stated summer 2026 arrival was an expectation.
What LANL selected
NVIDIA and the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration describe a codesigned program in which HPE will build the systems using HPE Cray supercomputing architecture. The planned technology stack includes NVIDIA Vera Rubin GPU nodes, Vera CPUs and Quantum-X800 InfiniBand networking on the HPE Cray Supercomputing GX5000 architecture.
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The announcement concerns three different systems rather than one replacement machine:
| System | Stated purpose | Published configuration or status |
|---|---|---|
| Mission | Classified national-security workloads; NVIDIA says it is intended to replace Crossroads for those workloads. | NVIDIA says the plan includes Rubin GPU nodes and 2,300 standalone Vera CPUs in an HPE Cray GX240 blade. This is a planned configuration, not a confirmed final inventory. |
| Vision | Open and fundamental science, including AI, materials and nuclear science, energy modeling, biomedical research, fusion and quantum-computing work. | No standalone Vera CPU count was given in the reviewed NVIDIA LANL announcement. DOE/NNSA places Mission and Vision in a combined 2027–2028 full-deployment window. |
| Veritas | LANL’s Laboratory-Directed Research and Development (LDRD) work, including experiments with agentic-AI technologies for larger systems. | NVIDIA reports approximately 1,150 standalone Vera CPUs plus Rubin GPU nodes. DOE/NNSA’s July announcement does not provide a Veritas schedule. |
All three are planned HPE-built systems based on the latest HPE Cray design, according to NVIDIA’s June 22, 2026 announcement.
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What each supercomputer is meant to do
Mission: national security
Mission is the classified-workload system. NVIDIA says its standalone Vera CPU partition will contain 2,300 CPUs and that the machine is intended to replace Crossroads. The published description makes Mission the clearest successor-oriented project, but it does not establish that replacement or operation has already occurred.
Vision: open research
Vision is intended for work that can support broader scientific research. NVIDIA lists foundation models, agentic AI, simulations, materials science, nuclear science, energy and biomedical research among its uses. The reviewed sources do not provide a final node count or assign Vision a specific deployment year within DOE/NNSA’s 2027–2028 window.
Veritas: an experimental proving ground
Veritas is focused on LDRD projects and on testing technologies that could later be used in larger LANL systems. NVIDIA reports about 1,150 standalone Vera CPUs, making this a substantial planned CPU partition, but the source material does not establish when Veritas will become operational.
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Has the first Vera server arrived at LANL?
Not conclusively, based on the official material reviewed for this article. DOE/NNSA’s July 16, 2026 announcement said a first Vera Rubin CPU server was expected to arrive at LANL in summer 2026 for testing. That wording describes an expected delivery, not a confirmation that delivery occurred.
The same distinction applies to the larger systems. DOE/NNSA says full deployment of Mission and Vision is expected in 2027 and 2028, while NVIDIA’s June blog says Mission and Vision were expected to be operational in 2027. These statements are projections with different levels of specificity; neither confirms present-day operation.
What NVIDIA says Vera CPUs add
NVIDIA’s current Vera CPU product page lists up to 88 custom Olympus cores, up to 1.2 terabytes per second (TB/s) of LPDDR5X memory bandwidth and up to 1.5 TB of memory. Those are product-level specifications and do not show that every LANL node will use the maximum memory configuration.
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The design emphasis is high memory bandwidth and capacity for applications that are difficult to feed with conventional processors. LANL chief architect of advanced technology systems Galen Shipman said the laboratory improved performance and efficiency by targeting unmet needs such as high-memory bandwidth and support for complex applications. That is an official statement about the design effort, not an independent system-wide measurement.
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How the reported performance figures should be read
NVIDIA reports several comparisons from LANL demonstrations. Each is limited to the named workload and comparison system:
- URSA: NVIDIA reports seven times higher performance than the CPUs in Crossroads on URSA workloads.
- Branson: NVIDIA reports more than three times the performance of Crossroads CPUs in an early test using Branson, an open-source Monte Carlo heat-transfer simulation tool.
- Broad product comparisons: NVIDIA claims more than three times the performance of a single-socket x86-based CPU, more than four times the memory per core and six times the memory per node.
These figures are vendor-reported, workload-specific comparisons. They are not universal CPU benchmarks, independent tests, proof of system-wide delivered performance or evidence of realized energy savings. The reviewed sources also provide no cost figures.
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Why the codesign matters
DOE/NNSA presents Mission and Vision as a partnership among LANL, HPE and NVIDIA rather than an off-the-shelf installation. NNSA Administrator Brandon Williams said the Genesis Mission calls for partnerships of this kind and that codesigning the systems from the ground up is intended to reduce discovery time “from months to minutes.” That phrase describes the program’s goal, not a measured result.
NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang called Vera Rubin “a new instrument for science,” referring to the combination of simulation, AI and data processing. In practice, the three-system plan separates classified production work, broadly accessible research and experimental technology development so each can be optimized for its intended users.
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- Known: LANL selected an HPE-built, HPE Cray architecture using NVIDIA Vera Rubin, Vera CPUs and Quantum-X800 InfiniBand.
- Known: Mission, Vision and Veritas have different stated roles.
- Known: NVIDIA published planned standalone CPU quantities for Mission and Veritas, but not Vision in the reviewed LANL announcement.
- Not established: That the first test server arrived during summer 2026.
- Not established: That any of the three systems is currently operational.
- Not established: Final system inventories, total cost, system-wide benchmark results or realized energy savings.
The Bottom Line
LANL’s Vera program is a three-system plan, not a confirmed completed deployment. Mission targets classified national-security computing, Vision targets open science and Veritas provides an LDRD test bed. NVIDIA has reported promising workload-specific CPU results and detailed product specifications, but the available official announcements do not confirm that the first Vera server—or the finished supercomputers—has landed and entered operation.
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