AI supercomputing is the key to accelerated AI development for a wide range of Big Data and Cloud modernization applications. World’s biggest AI event Microsoft Ignite 2023 kicks off tomorrow in Seattle to discuss the potential of AI and Big Data in computing. AI world’s sharpest minds and technology experts would assemble at the event to address technical roadblocks and ethical issues related to innovation, adoption, and open-sourcing AI and machine learning applications. AI supercomputing, for instance, is one area of innovation that new businesses can benefit the most. NVIDIA, a leading AI technology enabler, is teaming up with Microsoft to make this happen. The experts from these organizations would discuss the blueprint for success with AI supercomputing solutions that deliver next-gen Generative AI applications and LLMs.
Before we dive into the event in Seattle, let’s reveal more about the AI supercomputing market and current trends in general.
What is AI Supercomputing?
AI supercomputing sits at the pinnacle of any modern IT and programming engineering. IBM, Google, Meta, HPE, NVIDIA, and Microsoft have invested heavily in AI supercomputers. By 2028, the market would generate more than $3 billion, nearly doubling from its current projections. To accelerate AI workflows with new machine-learning capabilities, especially self-learning LLMs and generative AI models, organizations need hyper-computing processors, the core of AI supercomputing engineering.
So, how does the AI industry define supercomputing capabilities?
According to IBM, one of the pioneers in the field, supercomputing technology comprises supercomputers, the fastest computers in the world. When these supercomputers are used to develop AI programs, they become synonymous with AI supercomputing technology. The main purpose of any supercomputer used in AI programs is to handle high-performance workloads required for different types of AI applications and workloads.
Because supercomputers are used to run artificial intelligence programs, supercomputing has become synonymous with AI. This regular use is because AI programs require high-performance computing that supercomputers offer. In other words, supercomputers can handle the unique types of workloads typically needed for AI applications. NVIDIA GPUs power some of the fastest AI supercomputers in the US. For example, Oak Ridge National Labs’ Summit (built by IBM) is the world’s smartest supercomputer. It is embedded with the most advanced HPC and AI components for scientific discovery. IBM has built the Sierra supercomputers to manage the ever-growing big data and AI workloads in the advancing engineering fields and domains.
Other powerful AI supercomputing platforms include the HPE Cray supercomputers, Meta’s AI Research Super Cluster (RSC), Microsoft AGI Supercomputer (built in collaboration with OpenAI), and NVIDIA’s DGX GH200 AI Supercomputer. The AI supercomputing market also consists of formidable players such as Intel, Samsung, Advanced Micro Devices, Micron Technology, AWS, Dell, Tela, Oracle, and Groq.
What makes Microsoft Azure and NVIDIA Partnership so unique in the AI Supercomputing marketplace?
AI development costs are directly proportional to the cloud costs. Business leaders mentioned cloud cost management is their biggest challenge in 2023. Cloud storage costs, in particular, have the most impact on the current CIO IT costs budgeting, beating security and computing costs. According to Virtana’s survey done in 2021, 81% of organizations mentioned they have incurred “hidden cloud costs” while running their workloads on public cloud platforms. Growing cloud complexities, increasing vulnerabilities, shadow IT, and countless other challenges have resulted in further escalation of cloud costs in 2023. But, nothing beats the rise of generative AI costs on the cloud. IPaaS, DaaS, and DRaaS vendors find themselves in a peculiar situation in the era of ChatGPTs and LLMs, where AI development companies expect their service providers to provide a comprehensive software portfolio for HPC/AI workloads. These services and solutions have to be intuitively optimized for HPC/AI applications and performance, supported by a resident module of AI supercomputing hub. Microsoft Azure and NVIDIA partnership is a sprint toward this direction.
At the Microsoft Ignite conference, NVIDIA and Microsoft AI teams would jointly disclose the value propositions of their partnership for ratios, workloads, and accelerators. In addition to discussions on the rising cloud costs for generative AI development, the partners would also provide unparalleled insights on the transformative role of AI for HPC-focused IT and cloud management in 2024.
Here are the key areas of collaboration between the two AI behemoths — Microsoft and NVIDIA.
NVIDIA’s AI Solutions Portfolio with Microsoft Azure
NVIDIA has teamed up with the Azure team at Microsoft to bring state-of-the-art AI infrastructure and software applications to tackle the existing workloads for customers and vendors. We could witness the NVIDIA CUDA programming model for Microsoft AI Supercomputing workloads. These could support 700+ GPU-accelerated applications in the HPC domain.
Currently, NVIDIA provides these solutions as pre-configured, containerized software. The NVIDIA DGX Cloud is available on Microsoft Azure. This partnership allows enterprises to train AI ML models for generative AI and advanced large language models and NLP applications.
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Additionally, Microsoft Azure will host NVIDIA Oniverse Cloud to accelerate the digitalization of enterprise industrial automation and augmented intelligence operations. These would emerge as the cornerstone of “digital twins” deployment in the factories and supply chain industries. NVIDIA Omniverse Cloud and Microsoft Azure would develop a new PaaS offering to give businesses instant access to full-stack AI and cloud modernization environments for a large number of digitalized operations.
Microsoft Ignite would also provide a platform to NVIDIA GPU-accelerated virtual machines, currently running on Azure. The recently announced ND H100 v5-series powered by NVIDIA H100 Tensor Core GPUs and NVIDIA Quantum-2 InfiniBand networking are expected to be the show-stoppers at the event. These AI supercomputing applications could spell a quantum leap in the HPC and scalability space, empowering IT teams to develop the best-class models for AI/ LLM training and inference workload management.
NVIDIA experts would also take the stage through multiple sessions at the Microsoft Ignite. These sessions would address the challenges in unlocking Gen AI capabilities in Enterprise. Separate sessions are organized for protection data and AI models on Azure. Overall, attendees will have first-hand experience in deploying NVIDIA AI Enterprise in Azure Machine Learning to build, develop, deploy, and scale AI and LLMs at production-level speed and quality without denting the cloud budgets in 2024.
Key speakers on AI technologies include:
- Satya Nadella, CEO and Chairman, Microsoft
- Charlie Bell, EVP, Cloud Security, Compliance, Identity and Management at Microsoft
- Carolyne Van Den Hoogen, product marketing specialist for the DGX platform at NVIDIA
- Robin Wood, director of global partner development at Microsoft
- Vikas Bhatia, head of product for Azure Confidential Computing at Microsoft
- Michael O’Connor, senior director of software architecture at NVIDIA
- Abhishek Sawarkar, a product manager for GPU Cloud at NVIDIA
- Ian Buck, vice president of high-performance computing and hyper-scale at NVIDIA
- Nidhi Chappell, general manager of generative AI and high-performance computing at Microsoft Azure
FAQs Related to the Microsoft Ignite 2023
When is the Microsoft Ignite 2023 scheduled to go Live?
The Microsoft Ignite 2023 is an in-person as well as digital AI event for startup founders, researchers, developers, IT and cloud architects, and product managers. The in-person event kicks off in Seattle on 14 November 2023. The four-day in-person event will provide direct access to experts to solve technical roadblocks in AI and LLM generation on cloud platforms. However, the Microsoft Ignite opening keynote is marked for 15 November. CEO of Microsoft Satya Nadella will share how his company is creating new opportunities across multiple platforms in this new era of AI.
Is there a virtual event at Microsoft Ignite?
Yes. The virtual event goes live on 15 November. The organizers have mentioned that some sessions will be recorded. Viewers and listeners can access these recorded sessions later, on-demand.
What are the different types of sessions at the Microsoft Ignite?
The event has been split into multiple formats. These are:
- Keynote
- Lab
- Discussions
- Product Roundtables (includes the collaboration with NVIDIA)
- Demo
- Studio Interview
- Pre-recorded sessions
What are the key topics that will be discussed at the event?
The key topics at the event include:
- AI supercomputing
- AI and applications
- Business Applications
- Cloud security and networking
- Microsoft Certifications
- AI-led Industrial transformations
- Hybrid Cloud Rollouts
- AI in the modern workplace
Are there other companies that are speaking or exhibiting at the event?
Yes. The sessions will feature sessions and exhibits from these organizations:
- AMD
- Adobe
- Dell Technologies
- NVIDIA
- Neat
- HP/ HP Poly
- Intel
- Crestron
- Cisco Systems
- DocuSign
- Kyndryl
- Pure Storage
- Rubrik
- Fujitsu
- ServiceNow
- ANSYS
- Lenovo
- HashiCorp, and others
Where can I find the top news and analysis of the announcements made at the Microsoft Ignite 2023?
You can read the latest news at CIO Influence and AiThority.com. The publications are running exclusive newsletters and social media campaigns to cover the announcements made during the event.
You can also join the conversation by using the social media tags: #MSIgnite #CIOinfluence #AIThorityNews #NVIDIAatCIOInfluence.
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