AvidThink

Research and Analysis

AvidThink 2024 March Newsletter

12,000! That’s the number of in-person KubeCon + CloudNativeCon EU 2024 (19-22 Mar, Paris) attendees announced by the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (part of Linux Foundation). AvidThink’s Roy Chua was back again in Europe and feeling out of place, having brought a sport coat instead of a hoodie.

OFC 2024 Showcase

While Roy was in Paris, our media partner, Jim Carroll, Converge Digest, was at Nvidia GTC, taking in the latest and jostling with the 11K live attendees streaming into SAP Center and at the San Jose Convention Center. The following week, Jim was busy gathering videos at OFC in San Diego.

Optical is a hot topic given the need to move large data sets critical for AI/ML training. Just look at Astera Lab’s recent IPO, and do check out our OFC showcase on NextGenInfra.io.

Nvidia GTC 2024 Quick Takes

Meanwhile, the following GTC quick takes are from Roy tuning into sessions remotely and Jim’s on-the-ground conversations:

  • Nvidia’s new Blackwell GPU (GB200) performance is impressive (1+ exaflop in a rack!) but also points to the need to support cost-effective inferencing.
  • Sheer scale-up with DGX SuperPOD — liquid-cooled racks featuring tens of thousands of GB200 Grace Blackwell Superchips (each chip has 36 Grace CPUs and 72 Blackwell GPUs connected via 5th generation NVLink).
  • Nvidia Inference Microservices (NIM) are packaged versions of optimized software/models that allow developers to quickly deploy popular models for inferencing. With NIM, Nvidia aims to expand their software moat that started with CUDA.
  • Quantum-X800 InfiniBand and Spectrum-X800 Ethernet networking platforms are capable of end-to-end 800Gb/s throughput. Support for NVIDIA’s Scalable Hierarchical Aggregation and Reduction Protocol (SHARPv4) provides improved training performance and reduced job completion time.
  • The evolving interaction of AI and the physical world with Project GR00T (love that name), which leverages Isaac Lab/Platform, OSMO, and Jetson Thor to help create a new era of humanoid robots.
  • Expansion of use cases into more verticals — automotive, and mobile with 6G Research Cloud (Aerial/Sionna). We note that Sionna was available in early 2022, Aerial SDK was unveiled in late 2019, followed by Aerial Research Cloud in early 2023. There was limited traction in the RAN vendor community, but with the increased interest in O-RAN, plus spillover hype from GenAI, Nvidia likely sees this as an opportune time to push into the telco market.
  • Partnerships with everyone — Dell, Oracle, AWS, Microsoft, and others featured during Jensen’s keynote. Nvidia understands the importance of building and incentivizing the village around it.

Whether hype or reality, the buzz was palpable, and Jensen Huang’s star is ascendent — it’s time for us to trade in our analyst/journalist sport coats for leather jackets.

KubeCon EU 2024 Quick Takes

Even if you don’t interact with Kubernetes, it’s always useful to understand cloud-native trends as they will eventually spread into enterprises and telcos. Here are Roy’s takeaways from KubeCon + CloudNativeCon EU 2024:

  • Kubernetes has been a catalyst for cloud-native innovation over the past decade, though it may have to evolve for AI/ML workloads.
  • WebAssembly or WASM, coupled with projects like Spin and wasmCloud, is gaining momentum for enabling highly portable, efficient workloads across cloud, edge, and on-prem environments. Real-world case studies from ZEISS Group and POCs at Orange and other telcos showed cost savings, performance gains, and deployment agility.
  • Sustainability took center stage, with examples of leveraging cloud-native technologies and projects like Kepler to monitor and optimize computing’s energy consumption and carbon footprint.
  • eBPF’s (an in-kernel technology that allows safe loading of custom user code) prominence continues to grow, powering projects like Cilium to enhance networking, security, and observability for cloud-native deployments.
  • Security remains a top priority, with emphasis on supply chain security, zero-trust models, and shifting left.
  • Platform engineering is on the rise, with a focus on building tailored internal developer platforms to streamline development and empower developers as customers.

As Kubernetes enters its second decade, priorities are shifting to optimizing developer experiences, security, observability, and embracing sustainable computing.

Watch Roy’s discussion with former Gartner VP and independent analyst Sanjeev Mohan on the IT Depends podcast for more KubeCon learnings.

Pre-Summer Events

Events that AvidThink and Converge Digest will be at in the next few months include:

We’ll miss OCP Regional 2024(24-25 April) in Lisbon, but we encourage you to attend. With today’s industry focus on data centers, power, cooling, high-speed interconnect, chiplets, and disaggregated architectures, OCP Regional is a good place to catch up on the latest.

Webinars and Panels

AvidThink was on multiple panels in March. Here are MWC-related ones: 1&1 Mobilfunk CEO & Rakuten Symphony at MWC, Analyst Wrap-Up with Peter Jarich, on-site with JMA Wireless and Federated Wireless, wrap-Up with Allyson Klein/TechArena, Leonard Lee/neXt Curve and Prakash Sangam/Tantra. Plus a NaaS-focused podcast with MEF CTO, Pascal Menezes, and a SASE panel with SSE Forum (Jaye Willson and John Spiegel).

News

And now, here is our rundown of the news in March.

5G

AT&T Targets Enterprises with 5G Fixed Wireless Access Service Nationwide
AT&T is pushing its AT&T Internet Air for Business, a 5G fixed wireless access service supporting LTE, 5G, and 5G+, to small, mid-size and large businesses nationwide.

Reliance Jio Completes Nationwide 5G SA Rollout in India, Supports Network Slicing
Reliance Jio claims to have deployed a nationwide 5G standalone network in India using Ericsson and Nokia gear, with over 100 million of its 470 million customers using the service. Jio’s 5G SA network supports multiple network slices for gaming, high security, and FWA.

Ericsson and Nokia Target U.S. Military’s 5G Business with Dedicated Federal Units
Ericsson and Nokia have created specific divisions to sell services and equipment to the U.S. federal government, particularly the Department of Defense. With around 800 military installations that could support at least a handful of 5G sites each, the DoD represents a significant opportunity.

6G

Samsung Showcases 6G-Ready Massive MIMO Prototype Arrays at MWC Barcelona
Samsung Electronics America displayed two new 6G-ready massive MIMO prototype arrays at MWC Barcelona. The company expects to support 6G in the 6 GHz spectrum in Europe and 13 GHz in the U.S., with pre-commercial test deployments anticipated around 2029.

Private Networks

EchoStar Wins DoD Contract Extension for Private 5G Networks at Military Bases
EchoStar secured a contract extension from the Department of Defense to continue deploying standalone 5G networks at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickman in Hawaii and Naval Air Station Whidbey Island in Washington state through 2025.

Tesla Hints at Developing Private 5G Networks for Vehicles and Optimus Robots
A Tesla job posting implies the company is developing a private 5G network for its vehicles and Optimus robots, requiring ultra-reliability and high data rates. Recent reports also suggest Tesla is talking with Jio on building a 5G network for its manufacturing plant in India.

Boldyn Networks Acquires Cellnex’s Private Networking Unit, Expands Portfolio
Boldyn Networks will purchase Cellnex’s private networking unit, including Edzcom, adding over 50 private networks to its portfolio as part of its strategy to build its 5G networking business.

Open RAN

Open RAN Failing to Deliver on Promises, Market Share of Top Vendors Remains Unchanged
Light Reading columnist Iain Morris thinks Open RAN technology is not living up to its promise of opening up the market. The market share of the top telecom equipment vendors has remained unchanged, and early Open RAN champions like Rakuten Symphony and Parallel Wireless are facing challenges.

Cloud

Oracle Partners with QMware to Offer Quantum Computing on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure
Oracle partnered with QMware, a Swiss startup, to deliver quantum computing’s performance benefits. QMware’s quantum simulation software, providing 42 logical qubits of processing power, will run on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure powered by Nvidia A100 GPUs.

European Cloud Providers Warn of Broadcom’s VMware Overhaul Impact on Costs and Competition
The Cloud Infrastructure Services Providers in Europe (CISPE) coalition is warning that Broadcom’s overhaul of VMware’s business is resulting in price hikes and licensing changes that may force some cloud providers out of business. Enterprises are facing 2X to 3X cost increases, according to Gartner.

Former Microsoft Metaswitch CEO Martin Lund Joins Cisco to Head Common Hardware Group
Martin Lund, former CEO of Metaswitch and VP of Microsoft’s Azure for operators business, is joining Cisco as EVP of the company’s Common Hardware Group. Lund will be responsible for the development and delivery of silicon, hardware systems, and optics.

IBM Acquires Network and IT Infrastructure Automation Firm Pliant
IBM purchased Boston-based network and IT infrastructure automation company Pliant for an undisclosed sum. IBM plans to use Pliant’s low- to no-code automation platform to enhance its provisioning, management, traffic management, and configuration platforms.

Microsoft Follows AWS and Google in Eliminating Cloud Data Egress Fees
Microsoft has joined Google Cloud and AWS in offering free cloud migration out of its Azure platform, eliminating a major impediment for companies looking to switch cloud providers.

Microsoft Azure Surpasses AWS in Public Cloud Adoption, Google Cloud Ranks Third
According to Flexera’s annual State of the Cloud report, Microsoft Azure leads in public cloud adoption at 80%, followed by AWS at 78% and Google Cloud at 50%. However, Synergy Research Group’s market share data shows Amazon at 31%, Microsoft at 24%, and Google at 11%.

Oracle’s Cloud Revenue Surpasses License Support for the First Time in Q3 FY2024
Oracle reported that its total cloud revenue, including IaaS and SaaS, surpassed its total license support revenue for the first time in Q3 FY2024. The company’s cloud revenue grew 25% to $5.1 billion, with IaaS revenue increasing 49% to $1.8 billion.

AI

HPE to Leverage Juniper Networks’ AI Expertise for Telco and Enterprise Infrastructure
HPE plans to embrace Juniper Networks’ AI leadership following its proposed $14 billion acquisition, initially for enterprise infrastructure and eventually for telco AI. HPE envisions AI helping with subscriber management, optimizing handoffs between towers, and automating the 5G core.

Nvidia Unveils New GPUs, Networking, and Enterprise Tools for AI Development
Nvidia released a series of new accelerated computing platforms and AI networking tools for enterprise AI development, including Blackwell, a computational platform for AI that delivers up to 20 petaFLOPs of performance per chip.

HPE Integrates Internally Developed GenAI Models into Aruba Networking Central Management Platform
HPE is incorporating its internally developed GenAI large language models into its Aruba Networking Central management platform. The LLMs, trained on Aruba’s extensive telemetry data, aim to enhance user experience, operational efficiency, search response times, and data privacy.

Microsoft Hires DeepMind Co-Founder Mustafa Suleyman to Lead AI Consumer Group
Microsoft hired Inflection AI and Google DeepMind co-founder Mustafa Suleyman as EVP and CEO of its newly formed Microsoft AI consumer group. Suleyman will oversee MSFT AI Copilot, the Bing search engine, and other related consumer products, reporting to CEO Satya Nadella.

SD-WAN

Nitel Strengthens SD-WAN Expertise with WAN Dynamics Acquisition
Network-as-a-service provider Nitel is acquiring WAN Dynamics, an SD-WAN firm, to bolster its international business and extend its SD-WAN expertise and support for its managed SD-WAN product. This follows Nitel’s 2022 acquisition of Hypercore Networks, which also provides SD-WAN services.

AT&T and Comcast Business Lead U.S. Managed SD-WAN Market Amid Growth Challenges
Vertical Systems Group’s Managed SD-WAN Leaderboard report found a 24% increase in managed SD-WAN sites in the U.S. in 2023, despite slower-than-expected growth due to providers focusing on fulfilling existing orders and upgrading services for current customers.

And that’s a wrap! We’ll be back in early May with our April roundup. Meanwhile, feel free to contact us at [email protected].