09/08/2024 What I Read Last Week
#DigitalInfrastructure news: xAI training cluster, Multi-Datacenter Training, Data Centers in Space, Verizon, Airtrunk
Weekly Edition of curated news about Digital Infrastructure
After posting about the Tesla AI Cortex training supercluster last week Elon Musk posted that… over the weekend the @xAI team brought the Colussus 100k H100 training cluster online. Elon said “Colossus is the most powerful AI training system in the world. Moreover, it will double in size to 200k (50k H200s) in a few months.” After reading this tweet I reminded myself of the 1970 movie Colossus: The Forbin Project; where electronics genius Charles Forbin creates a massive computer complex that is capable of independently regulating the national defense of the United States. 🤪
[Link] SemiAnalysis: Multi-Datacenter Training: OpenAI's Ambitious Plan To Beat Google's Infrastructure. Gigawatt Clusters, Telecom Networking, Long Haul Fiber, Hierarchical & Asynchronous SGD, Distributed Infrastructure Winners. This is an absolutely amazing post. Although I am torn, my short attention span struggled to get through it, yet the visuals and aerial maps of data center sites brought me back in. I am going back to re-read now….
[Link] Beth Kindig posted that Japan is reportedly planning to begin development of a Zettascale supercomputer next year, which would be 1,000x faster than exascale systems operating today.
[Link] Y Combinator had a story about Lumen Orbit building data centers in space in order to make use of 24/7 solar energy and passive cooling. The Lumen Orbit website has a fun concept video of a 5 GW data center in space, as well as their white paper: Why we should train AI in space.
[Link] Verizon to acquire Frontier Communications for $20 Billion. Frontier’s 2.2 million fiber subscribers across 25 states will join Verizon’s approximately 7.4 million Fios connections in 9 states and Washington, D.C. In addition to Frontier’s 7.2 million fiber locations, the company is committed to its plan to build out an additional 2.8 million fiber locations by the end of 2026. Fierce Network talked with Verizon Consumer Group CEO Sowmyanarayn Sampath about the acquisition and the company's focus on mobility and fixed broadband.
[Link] Alternative asset manager Blackstone, along with the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board have entered into a definitive agreement to acquire leading Asia Pacific data center platform AirTrunk for $24 Billion. AirTrunk is the largest data center platform in the Asia Pacific region, with a sizeable presence in Australia, Japan, Malaysia, Hong Kong, and Singapore. It has more than 800MW of capacity committed to customers and owns land that can support over 1GW of future growth across the region.
[Link] EE Times: The Quantum Leap in Cybersecurity: A New Era of Challenges. Quantum computing poses a significant threat to current encryption methods, potentially allowing future quantum computers to crack today's encrypted data. To address this, NIST has developed quantum-resistant encryption standards, marking a crucial shift in cybersecurity. Early adoption of these standards is vital, especially for sectors dealing with long-term sensitive data like government, finance, and defense. Organizations face the challenge of integrating these new cryptographic algorithms into existing systems, a process compared to the Y2K transition in terms of complexity and resource requirements.
[Link] Juniper Networks announced an investment in Quantum Bridge Technologies , an industry leader in Distributed Symmetric Key Exchange (DSKE) for post-quantum cryptography (PQC) networks. Quantum Bridge’s patented DSKE technology provides a symmetric key distribution solution, delivering future-proofed security at scale without the use of any asymmetric cryptography and offers a sustainable security framework that seamlessly integrates into existing infrastructure.
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