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Posts Tagged 'Hyperscale data centers'

  • June 18, 2024

    Custom Compute in the AI Era

    This article is the final installment in a series of talks delivered Accelerated Infrastructure for the AI Era, a one-day symposium held by Marvell in April 2024. 

    AI demands are pushing the limits of semiconductor technology, and hyperscale operators are at the forefront of adoption—they develop and deploy leading-edge technology that increases compute capacity. These large operators seek to optimize performance while simultaneously lowering total cost of ownership (TCO). With billions of dollars on the line, many have turned to custom silicon to meet their TCO and compute performance objectives.

    But building a custom compute solution is no small matter. Doing so requires a large IP portfolio, significant R&D scale and decades of experience to create the mix of ingredients that make up custom AI silicon. Today, Marvell is partnering with hyperscale operators to deliver custom compute silicon that’s enabling their AI growth trajectories.

    Why are hyperscale operators turning to custom compute?

    Hyperscale operators have always been focused on maximizing both performance and efficiency, but new demands from AI applications have amplified the pressure. According to Raghib Hussain, president of products and technologies at Marvell, “Every hyperscaler is focused on optimizing every aspect of their platform because the order of magnitude of impact is much, much higher than before. They are not only achieving the highest performance, but also saving billions of dollars.”

    With multiple business models in the cloud, including internal apps, infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS), and software-as-a-service (SaaS)—the latter of which is the fastest-growing market thanks to generative AI—hyperscale operators are constantly seeking ways to improve their total cost of ownership. Custom compute allows them to do just that. Operators are first adopting custom compute platforms for their mass-scale internal applications, such as search and their own SaaS applications. Next up for greater custom adoption will be third-party SaaS and IaaS, where the operator offers their own custom compute as an alternative to merchant options.

    Progression of custom silicon adoption in hyperscale data centers.

    Progression of custom silicon adoption in hyperscale data centers.

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  • August 16, 2021

    Highly Integrated Silicon Photonics Light Engines in High-Speed Data Transport

    By Radha Nagarajan, SVP and CTO, Optical and Copper Connectivity Business Group

    The exponential increase in bandwidth demand will drive continuous innovation in, and deployment of, data movement interconnects for Cloud and Telecom providers.  As a result, highly integrated silicon photonics platform solutions are expected to become a key enabling technology for the cloud and telecom market over the next decade.

    What Does Highly Integrated Silicon Photonics Platform Mean for the Infrastructure Business?

    As speed continues to go up, optical will replace copper as the primary conduit of the digital bits inside Cloud data centers.  Marvell is investing heavily in silicon photonics to complement our high-speed CMOS technologies in data center interconnects to accelerate this transition.

    • Silicon photonic solutions have been successfully deployed inside Cloud data centers for 100G to compete with traditional “chip-and-wire” discrete solutions.  We expect silicon photonics will gain market share as the Cloud providers transition to the next bit rate of 400G.
    • Integrated silicon photonics platform solutions have intrinsic advantage over conventional packaging solutions at ever increasing baud rates.
    • Hyperscale data centers have limited power and cooling available for severs and interconnects. Integration technology is attractive where space and power savings are critical.
    • Integrating optical components on a silicon interposer can leverage the cost benefits of large-scale automated electronics assembly eco-system versus the traditional “chip-and-wire” optical industry.
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