Supermicro debuts server class edge systems for open 5G radio access network (RAN) offerings

Supermicro Computer announced new solutions for 5G cell tower deployments leveraging fully-configurable SuperServers based on second generation Intel Xeon Scalable processors, O-RAN compliant partner software, and ability to operate in harsh environments. These capabilities accelerate the mobile network evolution from proprietary hardware/software to open source software and disaggregated hardware for 5G installations. 

Supermicro's two new systems are its first servers for 5G, the Intelligent Edge, and other embedded applications to be based on second generation Intel Xeon processors. 

The E403-9P-FN2T is built for demanding environments and includes three PCI-E slots for GPU and FPGA accelerator cards. The compact 1U 1019P-FHN2T is ideal for controlled environments such as micro data centers and re-purposed central office locations and features two full-height full-length PCI-E slots.

With these expansion slots, Supermicro can provide real-time Edge AI inferencing via GPU cards, and accelerate 5G RAN software and open-standard site-to-site communication using the Intel FPGA Programmable Acceleration Card N3000. These new servers complement Supermicro's Xeon D-based 1019D and E403 models. 

Supermicro is developing IP65-rated protective enclosures to meet the needs of outdoor environments such as cell towers and microcell sites.

Supermicro is a market leader in delivering high-performance, power-efficient open hardware server platforms extending the data center level remote management to edge computing platforms, and has deep experience with virtualization and containers, including software such as Kubernetes and VMware. 

The 5G architecture is based on open hardware platforms connected by standardized interfaces, and virtualized network elements. Supermicro joined the O-RAN Alliance to help build a cloud-native, open 5G RAN architecture, and these solutions will concurrently support 4G as networks transition to 5G.

The 5G core network has moved to a virtualized model, which runs on data center hardware where Supermicro's Resource-Saving Architecture provides computing platforms such as the high-performance multi-node BigTwin and the high-density SuperBlade and MicroBlade products. These systems leverage shared cooling and efficient power, and feature a disaggregated structure to enable the latest upgrades without the wasteful rip-and-replace of entire server racks.

Supermicro aligns with Intel to offer large scale distributed training AI systems to meet needs of deep learning training models

Super Micro Computer is collaborating with Intel on AI solutions that are validated on the Intel Nervana Neural Network Processor for Training (NNP-T). Intel's NNP-T is a purpose-built AI training ASIC supporting the growing compute needs of deep learning training models.

The Intel Nervana NNP-T solves memory constraints and is designed to scale out through systems with racks easier than today's solutions. As part of the validation process, Supermicro integrated 8 NNP-T processors, dual 2nd Generation Intel Xeon scalable processors, up to 6TB DDR4 memory per node supporting both PCIe card and OAM form factors. Supermicro NNP-T systems are expected to be available mid-year 2020.

With high compute utilization and high-efficiency memory architecture for complex deep learning models, the Supermicro NNP-T AI System is built to validate two key real-world considerations: accelerating the time to train ever-complex AI models and doing it within a given power budget. The system enables faster AI model training with images and speech, more efficient gas & oil exploration, more accurate medical image analytics, and faster autonomous driving model generation.

"Supermicro is excited to cooperate with Intel for the Nervana NNP-T platform," said Charles Liang, president, and CEO of Supermicro. "Striking a balance among computing, communication, and memory, the validated NNP-T ASICs on Supermicro systems can train large AI models with near-linear scaling efficiency via intra- and inter-chassis links."

"Supermicro has validated our Deep Learning (DL) solution and is helping us prove the Nervana NNP-T system architecture, including card and server design, interconnect, and rack," said Naveen Rao, corporate vice president and general manager, Artificial Intelligence Products Group, Intel.

Cortical.io releases initial application of real-time semantic supercomputing based on natural language understanding

Cortical.io announced Tuesday debut of a new class of high-performance enterprise applications based on “Semantic Supercomputing,” which combines Cortical.io AI-based NLU software inspired by neuroscience with hardware acceleration to create new solutions to understand and process streams of natural language content at massive scale in real time.

The first application of Semantic Supercomputing, a Messaging Classification Appliance that can filter, classify and route streams of messages in real time by understanding the semantic content – the meaning and intent of the messages – was unveiled Tuesday at Xilinx Developer Forum (XDF) Europe keynote session in The Hague.

The Cortical.io approach to NLU is inspired by the latest findings on the way the brain processes information. This approach provides advantages over traditional machine learning methods and helps businesses solve many open NLU challenges like meaning-based filtering of terabytes of unstructured text data, real-time topic detection in social media, or semantic search over millions of documents across languages.

Building on the alliance announced with Xilinx at last month’s at XDF Americas in San Jose, Cortical.io is developing this first of a series of FPGA-based appliances powered by Xilinx Alveo accelerator cards. Cortical.io also announced it is partnering with Supermicro (SMCI), vendor of enterprise computing, storage, networking solutions and green computing technology, to deliver the email solution on a pre-loaded server. 

The appliance will enable enterprises to filter and route massive volumes of email messages in real time with high precision and recall based on the meaning of the message. The product will be available in the first quarter of next year.

“Ever-increasing unstructured data is overwhelming the world and the available processing power and current statistical approaches to deal with it,” said Francisco Webber, co-founder and CEO of Cortical.io. “We are taking the concept of supercomputing to the next level with the introduction of Semantic Supercomputing and the ability to deliver real-time processing of semantic content.”

“The goal is to reduce the wasted efforts of handling irrelevant or misdirected emails by first line business operations – including support, sales, purchasing,” said Cortical.io CMO Steve Levine. “The appliance will be able to handle a massive volume of messages daily in real time.”

Enterprise system administrators will be able to train the system and customize the filtering and routing based on a small number of sample emails. Once trained, the appliance works across multiple languages (English, Spanish, German, Portuguese, Cantonese, Arabic, French, Italian, Mandarin Chinese, Dutch).

“The demand for real-time AI services has never been greater and, together with Cortical.io and Supermicro, we’re excited to be building a solution for solving the incredible processing challenges of real-time Natural Language Understanding on a massive scale,” said Adam Scraba, director of marketing, Data Center Group, at Xilinx.

“Supermicro’s proven and extensive server portfolio when combined with Xilinx Alveo accelerators and the Cortical.io AI-based NLU software, delivers a sophisticated enterprise platform to address the growing data explosion, especially email,” said Don Clegg, senior vice president, Worldwide Sales, Supermicro.

This is the first instance of using the power of semantic supercomputing. 

“Our goal is to make possible the broad implementation and deployment of AI solutions for automating business processes and solving the most challenging use cases that depend on human understanding, decision making and execution,” added Cortical.io CEO Webber.

New Supermicro high-performance enterprise-class vSAN offering ideal for hyper-converged infrastructure

Super Micro Computer has introduced another enterprise-class vSAN solution to its broad portfolio of fully configured out-of-the-box systems.  Leveraging Supermicro Ultra SuperServer systems, combined with industry-proven vSAN software-defined storage, target hyper-convergence infrastructure.  

Supermicro 1U and 2U Ultra SuperServers support the highest performance Intel Xeon Scalable processors (up to 205W TDP) with 24 DIMM slots. Ultra platforms can support not only a large number of NVMe drives but also ample PCI-E lanes to accommodate network interface cards (NICs) to provide sufficient bandwidth for external access through fabrics. 

Ultra systems are configurable with support of 20, 10, 4, or 2 hot-swappable NVMe drives that can be optimized for different types of applications The Ultra SuperServers are tuned for power, efficiency, scale, and flexibility. 

Supermicro's solution has passed the rigorous testing to be certified for VMware vSAN ReadyNode, for balance and optimized performance – from the hardware up through the firmware stack to the VMware vSAN software. Native to the VMware vSphere hypervisor, VMware vSAN uses solid-state NVMe drives for high capacity input/output and low latency.

Seamless integration with VMware vSphere and the VMware ecosystem makes the hyperconverged solution optimal for cloud native applications, remote office and branch office implementations, test and development environments, management clusters, security zones, and virtual desktop infrastructure.

Supermicro is also launching the Intel Select Solutions for VMware vSAN. Intel Select Solutions from Supermicro are verified, ready-to-adopt workload-optimized configurations for specific workloads across compute, storage and networks. They help accelerate deployment of complex solutions by reducing the guesswork and in-house evaluation required to achieve excellent performance.

"Supermicro's extensive vSAN hyper-converged solution portfolio delivers to customers the ideal storage platform for business-critical applications," said Charles Liang, president, and CEO of Supermicro. "Supermicro systems and broad line of vSAN ready nodes are highly-configurable to support computational-intensive workloads while offering low total cost of ownership (TCO) for intelligent enterprise deployments."