Nvidia and SoftBank are collaborating on a pioneering platform for generative AI and 5G/6G applications which SoftBank plans to roll out across new, advanced AI data centres across Japan
The US tech giant Nvidia announced a collaboration with Japan-based telecom and IT operator SoftBank. In the framework of this cooperation, Nvidia will provide arm-based superchip and BlueField-3 DPU Power architecture to enable generative AI-driven wireless communications for SoftBank’s next-gen data centres.
A pioneering platform for generative AI and 5G/6G applications based on the NVIDIA GH200 Grace Hopper Superchip will power the new, distributed AI data centres across Japan. Those will host generative AI and wireless applications on a multi-tenant common server platform. The IT operator claims it significantly reduces costs and is more energy efficient. Besides, the new platform is expected to improve the performance, scalability and resource utilization of application workloads.
The aim of SoftBank is to provide next-generation social infrastructure to support the super-digitalized society in Japan, said Junichi Miyakawa, president and CEO of SoftBank Corp, as the company acknowledges the increasing demand for data processing and electricity requirements in the era of rapid AI development. The company is continuously developing 5G applications for autonomous driving, AI factories, augmented and virtual reality, computer vision and digital twins.
SoftBank itself is going to utilise the generative AI service for its internal communication. Thus, as of today, its proprietary AI Chat service is available to all SoftBank employees, approximately 20,000 people. The new tool is able to help with routine tasks such as creating documents and making translations. Furthermore, SoftBank aims to extend its AI Chat service to cover all internal work processes, e.g. planning and idea generation for proposals in sales and marketing, various programming activities for service development, and call centre tasks.
Meanwhile, the new interconnected AI data centres will be more evenly distributed across Softbank’s footprint and handle both AI and 5G workloads. This way, they can better operate at peak capacity with low latency and at substantially lower overall energy costs.
It was previously reported that AWS and NVIDIA Collaborate on Next Generation AI Infrastructure.
