S

SURF Tech Stack

Digital infrastructure cooperative for Dutch universities and research institutions

IT Services and IT Consulting Utrecht 201–500 employees Founded 1987 Nonprofit

SURF operates as a nonprofit cooperative providing shared digital services to Dutch educational and research institutions. The tech stack centers on high-performance computing (PyTorch, SLURM, GPFS) and enterprise identity management (Active Directory, Intune, Microsoft 365), with active projects around AI platform development and language model training. Recent hiring velocity is accelerating toward mid-level engineering and data roles, paired with a new Director-level AI & Data lead — signaling a shift from infrastructure maintenance toward building proprietary AI services for the research sector.

Tech Stack 13 technologies

Core StackPyTorch Python Confluent Intune Windows Server Microsoft Exchange vLLM SLURM GPFS Microsoft 365 Graph API Active Directory Federation Services PowerShell

What SURF Is Building

◆Challenges

Complex innovation challenges
Data and data management challenges
Service reliability
Infrastructure improvement
Complex ict landscape
Growth requiring more focus
Ensuring reliable hpc access
Maintaining high-performance hpc infrastructure
Internationalizing education services
Future-proofing education

▲Active Projects

Service roadmap development
Ai platform pilot
Training language models
Research commons
Ai infrastructure
Fair data initiatives
Improving slurm batch scheduling
Enhancing configuration management with confluent and saltstack
Optimizing gpfs parallel file system
Eduxchange

Hiring Activity

Accelerating10 roles · 7 in 30d

Department

Engineering

3

Data

2

Ops

2

Support

2

HR

1

Research

1

Security

1

Seniority

Mid

7

Senior

4

Director

1

Notable leadership hires: Director Advanced Solutions, Team Lead AI & Data

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About SURF

SURF is a member-owned cooperative uniting Dutch universities and research institutions to jointly procure and develop digital services. Headquartered in Utrecht, the organization serves approximately 200–500 staff across engineering, data, operations, and research functions. The core operational footprint includes high-performance computing infrastructure (SLURM scheduling, GPFS parallel storage), enterprise identity and collaboration platforms (Microsoft 365, Active Directory), and emerging AI systems. Current operational challenges center on HPC infrastructure reliability, data governance across fragmented institutional systems, and scaling AI capabilities to meet growing research demand.

HeadquartersUtrecht

Company Size201–500 employees

Founded1987

Hiring MarketsNetherlands, Peru

Frequently Asked Questions

What tech stack does SURF use?

SURF runs PyTorch, vLLM, and Python for AI workloads; SLURM and GPFS for HPC job scheduling and parallel storage; Confluent for event streaming; and Microsoft 365, Intune, and Active Directory Federation Services for enterprise identity and collaboration.

What is SURF working on?

Key projects include an AI platform pilot, training language models, AI infrastructure development, improving SLURM batch scheduling, optimizing GPFS parallel file systems, and the eduxchange service roadmap.