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The HBS Research Computing Platform (RCP) in the cloud will transform how computational research is supported at HBS.

Designed to meet the demands of modern research, this platform provides an array of computational tools in a project-based centralized system that facilitates collaboration, data management, and compliance.

What Does the RCP Offer?

  • Extensible cloud storage and compute power, including graphics processing units (GPUs)
  • Access to popular data science and statistical analysis tools including Jupyter Notebook, RStudio, Spyder, STATA, and Visual Studio Code, and cloud services like Amazon SageMaker
  • Project-based interface and customizable workbench based on user experience research

What About Cloud Costs?

  • The Project Owner can view cloud usage and costs in the RCP.
  • The RCP includes controls to monitor and manage costs, including faculty-level AWS subaccounts and code optimization in partnership with RCS and IT Research Technologies.
  • During the initial rollout, all cloud costs incurred on the platform will be covered through an automatic reimbursement process.
  • After the initial rollout, cloud costs incurred on the platform will be covered through an automatic reimbursement process up to a limit, set to cover most faculty and usage. Costs above the limit will be charged to research budgets, with increases to budgets as needed through the research budget supplement request process. We will gather data on cloud costs and usage to validate our budget assumptions.

Initial Release

The RCP will have an Initial Release in February 2025 with early adopters to gather feedback, facilitate iterative improvements, validate enhancements, and optimize resources, followed by an Expanded Release available to all HBS researchers and projects in Fall 2025.

If you have a project that you think will be a good fit for the Initial Release, contact Research Computing Services.

Initial Release Requirements

Criteria for inclusion in the Initial Release are:

  • Level 1, 2, or 3 data only
  • Project requirements compatible with available tools
  • No batch processing requirements
  • No archiving requirements
  • Faculty researcher understands this is an “early release” and is willing to provide feedback

To learn more about the Initial Release, visit our program page. If you have a project that will be a good fit for the Initial Release, contact Research Computing Services.

Getting Started

  1. Request an account and invite your team to request accounts:
  2. Login to the platform: https://researchcloud.hbs.edu/

  3. Project owners: Request a project space

    Note that before requesting a project space, project owners:

    • must be an HBS faculty member, doctoral student, or pre-approved postdoc
    • must have an RCP account
    • must have logged into their RCP account at least once

    Project owners must put in their own requests; one may not request a project on behalf of someone else.

  4. Use the RCP and manage your project

Feedback and support

Important

Guest Users: For expired passwords and password resets, please contact RCS.

If you have any questions or encounter issues, please let us know! You can contact our support team directly by emailing research@hbs.edu. We are here to help.