Calling the Big Sky supercomputer in Butte one of the “better-kept secrets” in Montana, the head of the company is traveling the state offering the power of high-speed supercomputing to small- and medium-sized businesses.

And the service is free until at least the end of 2010.

“If you do not compute, you do not compete. That’s what makes people thrive in this global economy, the knowledge economy,” said Earl Dodd, president and chief executive of the Rocky Mountain Supercomputing Center.

The Montana nonprofit corporation was founded in late 2008 with the purpose of bringing the High Performance Computing Cloud to Montana and to bring people, like Dodd who left the state to pursue advanced knowledge, back home. The supercomputer was running by July 2009, and primarily serves large companies, universities, American Indian businesses and government agencies. RMSC in Butte employs 4.5 full-time employees, including contractors, and has helped other Montana companies using the supercomputer retain or hire more than two dozen additional workers.

But now the shift is toward smaller companies.

“They are the backbone of the community. They are the backbone of the economy,” Dodd said.