2024 International Infocomm Show: Intel Demonstrates AI-Driven Transformation into Intelligent Networks

Recently, Intel held the "Intel 'Intelligent Future' AI Communication and Network Transformation Seminar" at the 2024 International Information and Communication Exhibition (hereinafter referred to as PT Exhibition). The event invited two major operator partners, China Mobile and China Telecom, to deeply discuss how Intel's network and edge AI technologies drive communication and network transformation, and fully demonstrated the intelligent blueprint for the future integration of AI and networks.

At Intel’s “Intelligent Future” AI Communications and Network Transformation Seminar, partners from China Mobile Cloud Competence Center and China Telecommunication Research Institute demonstrated how Intel technology can help telecom operators achieve business innovation and performance improvement.

China Mobile Cloud's "Tianchi" SDN, with the help of Intel's IPU (Infrastructure Processor Unit) technology, has achieved significant performance improvement and resource optimization. By offloading network traffic management and processing tasks to dedicated hardware IPUs, "Tianchi" SDN enhances data processing capabilities, improves resource utilization efficiency, and significantly shortens network response time, thus bringing users faster network response time and richer service experience.

China Telecom has successfully built a new FTTR-B (Fiber to The Room-Business) high-end gateway that integrates computing and networking by using Intel's CPU and AI computing power cards. This innovative solution integrates cloud, edge computing, AI and security technologies, and uses AI computing power cards to process data at the edge of the network, greatly reducing latency and successfully implementing the deployment of high-speed broadband solutions. The integrated intelligent gateway service includes advanced network security protection, business traffic management, and seamless integration with cloud computing services, providing users with a more secure, flexible and efficient network experience, laying a solid foundation for future smart home and IoT applications.

In the wave of digital transformation, Intel, with its deep accumulation in hardware, software and platform solutions, provides the telecommunications industry with a set of standardized and versatile end-to-end solutions to help telecom operators accelerate transformation and meet the new challenges of the 5G-A era.

With the popularization of industrial Internet, Internet of Things, Internet of Vehicles and various intelligent applications, the telecommunications industry's demand for performance continues to increase to support high-speed data transmission, low-latency communication and high-density connections of 5G networks. The high-performance processor solutions provided by Intel are designed to meet the stringent requirements of telecommunications operators in data processing, network management and service delivery.

The Intel® ^{Xeon® 6 processor (codenamed Sierra Forest) contains up to 288 cores, which is very suitable for processing 5G core network workloads, and can improve core network performance while reducing energy consumption. By using Intel's latest energy -} efficient core technology, operators will save more energy and costs, increase single-rack performance by 2.7 times, and provide industry-leading single-rack performance for 5G core network workloads.

The Intel® ^Xeon® 6 SoC (codenamed Granite Rapids-D) integrates the computing core of the Intel® ^Xeon® 6 processor and ^{the I/O core optimized for the edge, significantly improving the performance, energy efficiency and transistor density} of the SoC. The chip is equipped with dual-channel 100G Ethernet, which enhances the processing capabilities of edge computing and network-intensive tasks, and introduces advanced media acceleration technology to improve the transcoding and analysis performance of real-time OTT, video on demand (VOD) and broadcast media videos, promoting innovation in media applications. In addition, the built-in Intel® ^Quick Assist Technology (Intel® ^QAT ) optimizes network and storage performance while improving energy efficiency. Intel® ^vRAN Boost technology effectively reduces the energy consumption of virtualized RAN, bringing higher energy efficiency to operators.

While improving performance, energy saving and consumption reduction are still typical challenges faced by network operators. By utilizing Intel ^® Infrastructure Power Manager ( IPM), the average CPU energy consumption during operation is reduced by 30%, aiming to reduce the energy consumption and total cost of ownership of network infrastructure ^by optimizing power management. By utilizing the built-in telemetry function of Intel Xeon processors, CPU power consumption can be effectively reduced without affecting key performance indicators such as throughput, latency, and packet loss.

In the process of promoting network intelligence and virtualization, Intel has demonstrated outstanding technical strength in integrating AI in the RAN (radio access network) field. As the cornerstone of RAN intelligence, FlexRAN ^™ software is Intel's new generation technology platform for 5G networks. It not only speeds up development, allowing users to quickly build a fully virtualized radio access network, but also provides a variety of versions to meet the development and deployment needs at different stages. In addition, the Intel® ^vRAN AI Development Kit provides a series of AI development process optimization tools to help operators and developers build, train, optimize and deploy AI models for vRAN use cases, simplifying the developer's workflow, thereby greatly shortening the development cycle, aiming to accelerate the application of AI in RAN.

Intel's 5G-A converged edge computing platform solution is an advanced technology stack that uses the Intel® ^Xeon® processor ^SPR EE platform and Intel Sharp ^™ GPU to build a converged edge computing platform that integrates 5G networks and industry AI applications. The platform has built-in Intel® ^vRAN Boost vRAN acceleration technology, so there is no need to use external accelerators to accelerate 5G network loads, which reduces system complexity and costs. At the same time, through the overall performance optimization and function enhancement of BIOS/OS/K8S, the real-time performance of the entire converged platform is significantly improved to meet the needs of 5G networks and industry AI applications. The platform integrates Redcap, 5G TSN, 5G positioning capabilities, converged edge gateways, video analysis acceleration capabilities, and multiple network AI reference models that meet commercial requirements. Based on modular design, users can build a 5G-A + AI platform that meets their own industry like building blocks. At this PT exhibition, Intel also joined hands with East China Normal University and Guangdong Shiju Network Company to jointly release the "White Paper on 5G-A Precision Positioning Solutions Based on Intel Architecture", which details the solution for high-precision 5G positioning through AI technology.

Through close cooperation with operators and continuous investment in innovative technologies, Intel is helping the telecommunications industry build more efficient and intelligent future networks. Intel will continue to work with operators and industry partners to promote the continued growth and prosperity of the telecommunications industry.