Red Hat OpenShift and data-centric infrastructure initiatives in IOWN Global Forum

Open5G conference was held on October 6th. NTT(Masahisa Kawashima, VP of IOWN development office and IOWN GF Technology working group chair) and Intel (Clara Li, Senior Principal Engineer and IOWN GF Technical Steering committee chair) participated the spotlight session titled Data-Centric Infrastructure initiatives and discussed future disaggregated heterogeneous computing with Red Hat (Chris Wright, Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer). 

NTT and Intel are two of the founders, along with Sony, of the Innovative Optical and Wireless Network Global Forum (IOWN GF). Since its inception the global forum community has grown to over 70 members, including Red Hat, DELL, Orange, Ericsson, Nokia and many others.

In the era of artificial intelligence, scalable, high-speed data infrastructure is critical

Red Hat joined the IOWN Global Forum (IOWN GF) with the recognition that traditional computer architectures are no longer able to keep pace with ever-growing demand and the compute and network resources required into the era of artificial intelligence (AI) are unsustainable. A new approach to networking, data capture, management, and dissemination, as well as computing will be needed.  

The forum’s mission is to develop fundamental technologies for communication, computing, data, and energy efficiency that would usher in a quantum leap in performance improvement and enable a much smarter world with advanced applications, including digital twin computing.

The ultimate goal is to work collaboratively across many different industries to realize "a fully connected and intelligent society" that benefits people by creating a next-generation communications infrastructure and functions as a more responsive data pipeline highway like AI technology central nervous system across communication infrastructure.

OpenShift for Data-Centric Infrastructure 

What are Red Hat's expectations from IOWN technology in leading the development of next generation information and communication  technologies (ICT) and the vision for a better, smarter, more sustainable world?

We expect the work done by IOWN GF to accelerate development for the next-generation ICT infrastructure by using heterogeneous container orchestration platforms, such as Red Hat Enterprise Linux and Red Hat OpenShift, which is our enterprise-ready, Kubernetes container platform for managing hybrid cloud, multi-cloud, and edge deployments. 

We can make this happen with the co-creation of an AI platform that adapts heterogeneous computing and networking in data-centric infrastructure (DCI) converged with innovative optical and wireless networks. This important work will enable massive data volume to flow through our global networks and will allow us to develop life-changing technologies that help us make smarter choices for the future.  

Another important aspect to consider is that IOWN can help Communication Service Providers achieve net zero emissions by reducing the number of electronic network devices in the telecom network infrastructure, thanks to the introduction of Open APN (an all-photonics network) technology.  IOWN GF currently is targeting 10 use cases in cyber-physical systems and AI integrated communications.  The use cases leverage the technology advantages from Open APN  and DCI  architecture that are based on heterogeneous and disaggregated computing.   We are contributing to the development of a minimum variable version for DCI that runs both overlay solution workloads  including edge AI using digital twin computing and network service workloads including 5G Open vRAN and multi-access edge computing.  OpenShift can be a key piece of DCI , as a foundation for both types of workloads with secure isolation for each service provider.  The future computing infrastructure needs to be dynamic, accelerated and secure in nature, just like the containerized software today is composable and on-demand. OpenShift supports heterogeneous computing built with CPUs, GPUs, FPGAs, eASICs, Tofino P4 chipsets and with plans to support DPUs and IPUs that are composable compute units. Read more about how Red Hat continues to shape the future of software-defined hardware-accelerated infrastructure.

Challenges we are facing in delivering the IOWN vision

The major challenges we're facing are industry-agnostic standards and increasing the usability of DCI heterogeneous and disaggregated computing, as well as Open APN technology, across all industries. 

The telecom industry’s challenges require collaboration with other industries that have a different mindset. That's how we make real progress. Open source activities can help accelerate industry agnostic standards.  

We believe that we can accelerate the co-creation of the artificial intelligence area across all industries by the power of open source .  DCI designed as heterogeneous and composable computing across core and edge in disaggregated infrastructure over Open APN will be the next generation platform of AI integrated communication service providers.   

These major industry transitions are very exciting, but IOWN GF just getting started. When we combine these efforts with all IOWN GF member efforts, we can achieve our business goals and help to enable a more sustainable planet and better future for all.

Open5G 2021

Companies worldwide are putting their 5G plans into action – and, in the process, encountering new challenges, uncovering new opportunities, and finding out how 5G works when out in the open. At Open5G 2021, we’re inviting companies, experts and industry thought leaders from across the world to offer some insight into what 5G looks like out in the open. 

Red Hat Open5G telecom event