Nokia has announced its backing of the Ultra Ethernet Consortium (UEC), a group formed to develop new Ethernet specifications and software to meet the demands of AI and high-performance computing (HPC).
The consortium consists of companies seeking to establish industry-wide cooperation around upgrading Ethernet protocol to meet the rapidly evolving networking requirements of AI systems.
As a leader in building highly scalable, low-latency networks for data centres, Nokia plans to lend its expertise to the UEC.
“The AI revolution is driving more than just a need for expanded computing power—it’s also necessitating changes to networks, especially those linking together the computing clusters used for AI training and inference,” said Vach Kompella, Head of Nokia’s IP business.
“With Nokia’s support, the UEC will develop new standards, best practices and architectures purpose-built for specialised AI data centre networks.”
Nokia boasts substantial experience building web, enterprise, and service provider networks at scale. The company aims to apply this knowledge by contributing to several UEC working groups, helping ensure Ultra Ethernet meets the needs of all Nokia customers.
“Together with a broad ecosystem of consortium partners, our goal is to provide an open, interoperable standard that allows networks to be upgraded easily and inexpensively to meet the needs of AI and HPC applications,” said J Metz, Chair of the Ultra Ethernet Consortium.
“With strong partners like Nokia, we know the UEC will drive the kind of standard to ensure broad AI adoption.”
As AI continues permeating virtually every industry, Nokia remains focused on advancing customers’ ability to deploy AI quickly on a large scale. Ultra Ethernet promises to become a highly compatible, low-cost, and interoperable component of future AI and HPC application stacks.
(Photo by Uriel SC on Unsplash)
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