Cloud Hosting

In a recent blog post, Google announced the introduction of the Accelerator-Optimized VM (A2) family on Google Compute Engine, based on the NVIDIA Ampere A100 Tensor Core GPU. A2 provides up to 16 GPUs in a single VM and is the first A100-based offering in the public cloud.

Google designed the A2-family of VMs to boost training and inference computing performance for its customers. The A2 features the NVIDIA A-100 Tensor Core graphics processing unit based upthe newly NVIDIA Ampere architecture. According to the blog post, the A-100 offers up to 20 times the compute performance compared to the previous generation GPU, and comes with 40 GB of high performance HBM2 GPU memory. Also, A2 VMs come with up to 96 Intel Cascade Lake vCPUs, optional Local SSDs for workloads requiring faster data feeds to GPUs and up to 100 Gbps of networking.

When customers have more demanding workloads, the A2 offers the a2-megagpu-16g instance with 16 A100 GPUs, which include a total of 640 GB of GPU memory, 1.3 TB of system memory and all-in-all connected through NVSwitch with up to 9.6TB/s of aggregate bandwidth.

Source: https://cloud.google.com/blog/products/compute/announcing-google-cloud-a2-vm-family-based-on-nvidia-a100-gpu

Note that A2 also offers smaller configurations allowing customers to match their need for GPU compute power. Customers can choose between five configurations, from one to 16 GPUs, with two different CPU- and networking-to-GPU ratios - each GPU to be partitioned into as many as seven GPU instances, owing to Amperes multi-instance group (MIG) capability.

Ian Buck, general managerand vice president of Accelerated Computing at NVIDIA, wrote in a recent company blog post about the availability of the A-100 on GCP:

In cloud data centers, A100 can power a broad range of compute-intensive applications, including AI training and inference, data analytics, scientific computing, genomics, edge video analytics, 5G services, and more.

With the A2 family, VMs Google further expands its portfolio of predefined and custom VMs ranging from compute- to accelerator optimized machines. Moreover, the company continues to compete with other cloud vendors such as Microsoft, which recently released new general purpose and memory-optimized VM families on various Intel Chipsets (AVX-512) and AWS, which recently released EC2 Inf1 instances based on its Inferentia chips. Many of these new VM types are targeted for customers with AI and Machine Learning workloads.

Holger Mueller, principal analyst and vice president at Constellation Research Inc., told InfoQ:

The battle for cloud leadership is primarily fought in the AI battle, and that is all about getting the AI load of enterprises attracted to each vendor's cloud. In the middle are platform vendors like NVidia, that providea cross-cloud platform and on-premise option. So with Google bringing the newest Nvidia platform to its Google Cloud, it makes it easier for CxOs to move AI workloads across on-premises and to the (Google) cloud.

Also, he said:

With Google being the #3 vendor, it has to be more open and more creative at attracting load - and this is another example of the Google strategy. In contrast, the larger AWS and Azure strategy is still to move to cloud proprietary compute architectures for AI loads. CxOs need to be awarethat lock-in is still a desirable outcome for most technology vendors and needs to balance the risks between convenience, speed and lock-in.

Currently, the A2 VM family is in alpha, and customers can request access by signing up. Moreover, Google states that public availability and pricing information will come later in the year. And finally, the company also announced forthcoming Nvidia A100 support for Google Kubernetes Engine, Cloud AI Platform, and other services.

Excerpt from:
Google Launches the First NVIDIA Ampere A100 GPUs in the Cloud with Computing Engine A2 VMs - InfoQ.com

Peter Altmaier (CDU), Federal Minister of Economics and Energy, speaks at the virtual Gaia-X expert forum of the Federal Ministry of Economics.

picture alliance

The two biggest economies in the European Union hope they have an answer to the domination enjoyed by American and Chinese companies in the cloud computing industry: Gaia X

Amazon, Microsoft, Google and Alibaba are the four main players globally when it comes to cloud services. However, European policymakers have grown anxious about their dependence on a small number of major tech companies, which aren't European.

That has been the case in particular since the United States enacted a law in 2018 that compels U.S. firms to hand in data to American authorities, even if the latter is stored elsewhere in the world. Germany and France have concerns that the data of European citizens is at risk.

"Gaia X is a two-fold approach to a problem we face in Europe and a problem that every company in the world faces right now," Marco-Alexander Breit, head of Task Force Artificial Intelligence at the German economy ministry, told CNBC's "Beyond the Valley" podcast.

"We combine infrastructure services like data storage, data processing in Europe, but it is open for participation even for companies that are not from European origin, as long as they stick to our rules and adhere to our standards," said Breit, who heads the Gaia X project in Germany.

It is about realizing that relying too much maybe on external players, whether they are American or Chinese or from anywhere else, is not great in the new economy...

Dexter Thillien

senior industry analyst, Fitch Solutions

The Franco-German project, born in 2018, aims to provide a secure infrastructure for data, while simultaneously allowing companies to move data across borders. Its overarching principle is to enable European nations to become digitally sovereign a concept that has gained traction in recent years and could prove challenging for the traditional tech giants.

It's a "first step toward a broader ambition," said Dexter Thillien, senior industry analyst at Fitch Solutions.

"It is about realizing that relying too much maybe on external players, whether they are American or Chinese or from anywhere else, is not great in the new economy where data is going to be more important, and you need a European alternative," he added.

More than 300 organizations worldwide are involved with the project so far, including Orange, Deutsche Telekom and SAP. The goal is to launch the infrastructure in late 2020 or early 2021.

Gaia X would, for instance, give health care providers the ability to exchange data and algorithms in a safe way with other hospitals in their proximity. That could in turn help with emergency transplants and other life-threatening conditions.

However, the initiative has to become more attractive than the big players if it wants to succeed, Thillien said.

"It is not going to be easy for that product to find its place," he said, citing budget and technical constraints.

The annual budget for Gaia X is 1.5 million euros ($1.7 million).

Nonetheless, Breit said he believes those seemingly limited financial resources "are not important."

"The X framework and the X entity has only the responsibilities to make the ecosystem work, to negotiate the standards, to negotiate the rules, and to provide standardized IPs for example to make the software run," he said, adding that the major advancements in artificial intelligence would remain a task for the big tech companies themselves.

IP, or internet protocol, refers to a set of rules that facilitates the movement of data across networks. There are varying IP standards.

Read the original here:
Meet Gaia X Europe's answer to the power of U.S. and Chinese cloud giants - CNBC

New Jersey, United States,- Latest update on SaaS Cloud Computing Market Analysis report published with extensive market research, SaaS Cloud Computing Market growth analysis, and forecast by 2026. this report is highly predictive as it holds the overall market analysis of topmost companies into the SaaS Cloud Computing industry. With the classified SaaS Cloud Computing market research based on various growing regions, this report provides leading players portfolio along with sales, growth, market share, and so on.

The research report of the SaaS Cloud Computing market is predicted to accrue a significant remuneration portfolio by the end of the predicted time period. It includes parameters with respect to the SaaS Cloud Computing market dynamics incorporating varied driving forces affecting the commercialization graph of this business vertical and risks prevailing in the sphere. In addition, it also speaks about the SaaS Cloud Computing Market growth opportunities in the industry.

SaaS Cloud Computing Market Report covers the manufacturers data, including shipment, price, revenue, gross profit, interview record, business distribution etc., these data help the consumer know about the competitors better. This report also covers all the regions and countries of the world, which shows a regional development status, including SaaS Cloud Computing market size, volume and value, as well as price data.

SaaS Cloud Computing Market competition by top Manufacturers:

SaaS Cloud Computing Market Classification by Types:

SaaS Cloud Computing Market Size by End-user Application:

Listing a few pointers from the report:

The objective of the SaaS Cloud Computing Market Report:

Cataloging the competitive terrain of the SaaS Cloud Computing market:

Unveiling the geographical penetration of the SaaS Cloud Computing market:

The report of the SaaS Cloud Computing market is an in-depth analysis of the business vertical projected to record a commendable annual growth rate over the estimated time period. It also comprises of a precise evaluation of the dynamics related to this marketplace. The purpose of the SaaS Cloud Computing Market report is to provide important information related to the industry deliverables such as market size, valuation forecast, sales volume, etc.

Major Highlights from Table of contents are listed below for quick lookup into SaaS Cloud Computing Market report

About Us:

Market Research Intellect provides syndicated and customized research reports to clients from various industries and organizations with the aim of delivering functional expertise. We provide reports for all industries including Energy, Technology, Manufacturing and Construction, Chemicals and Materials, Food and Beverage, and more. These reports deliver an in-depth study of the market with industry analysis, the market value for regions and countries, and trends that are pertinent to the industry.

Contact Us:

Mr. Steven Fernandes

Market Research Intellect

New Jersey ( USA )

Tel: +1-650-781-4080

More:
SaaS Cloud Computing Market Size By Product Analysis, Application, End-Users, Regional Outlook, Competitive Strategies And Forecast Up To 2026 - 3rd...

The one-size-fits-all cloud model is no longer feasible for most enterprises. They want to optimize overall performance and application agility, while cutting cost and bolstering security -- and many organizations are turning to a multi-cloud strategy to do so.

Multi-cloud computing boasts a number of intriguing advantages, as well as notable drawbacks that users must weigh before adopting this type of architecture. Daryl Plummer, VP and distinguished analyst at Gartner, is a believer in the multi-cloud movement.

"Multi-cloud is necessary, and I believe multi-cloud will get better and better," he said. "There's a lot of great things going on [in the cloud market] despite the potential problems people might run into."

But before organizations go all in on multi-cloud, they must evaluate every aspect of this architecture -- good and bad -- so they know whether to implement this cloud strategy.

Organizations want it all -- flexibility, scalability, and cost and performance optimization. Multi-cloud can often address those demands better than on-premises infrastructure or single-cloud computing.

Plummer attributes three main advantages to this type of cloud infrastructure.

Different cloud providers have different strengths. This can be limiting when you use a single provider, but you can use it to your advantage with multi-cloud computing, Plummer said.

For example, Google Cloud is known for its containerization and AI services. "If you're in the Google developer ecosystem, then you've been in Kubernetes from the beginning -- because they basically came up with [the idea]. The same thing with AI, you get advantages by being associated with their particular ecosystem," said Plummer.

Developers who work with different clouds will have a deeper knowledge of each platform as well as earlier access to tools from those providers. Being up to date on offerings from multiple clouds enables users to optimize performance and management on all their clouds.

In order to attract and retain customers, cloud providers must compete on price, functionality, discounts, consulting and more. If an enterprise can viably use multiple clouds to create its cloud infrastructure, it has the power to negotiate and force vendors to compete for its business.

"Your ability to get the right deal for [your company] is measurably impacted by your willingness to work with different cloud providers."

Cloud providers must constantly evolve and expand their services and capabilities to remain competitive. And to attract new users, they often have to leapfrog their competitors to make it worth the effort to switch providers.

Your ability to get the right deal is measurably impacted by your willingness to work with different cloud providers. Daryl Plummer

If your enterprise wants to advance its IT capabilities in a continuous and seamless manner, it needs to take advantage of this vendor competition, while avoiding excess disruption, Plummer said.

Organizations can then create business value by utilizing the best of what's available across cloud platforms. "That turns into money [and] into new opportunity much quicker than you might imagine," Plummer said.

Multi-cloud is not the end-all, be-all of IT infrastructures. While it is a great choice for many organizations, it's not without its flaws. While acknowledging the benefits of multi-cloud, Plummer also highlights three drawbacks associated with this cloud strategy.

Deploying multiple clouds is complex. IT teams can struggle to configure services on one cloud, let alone configuring services on two or three clouds, Plummer said.

Multi-cloud architectures are not for everyone, especially if developers and administrators aren't prepared for the complicated management required by running more than one cloud.

It's a myth that organizations can uniformly optimize costs with a multi-cloud strategy. While it is possible, it is more complicated than you might think.

"If you do it across multiple cloud players, [you] usually wind up spending more initially, and it takes a lot longer to figure out how to optimize costs in that new model, even with better negotiation," Plummer said. This is not to say that if you adopt a multi-cloud strategy you won't be able to optimize your cost, but there is a learning curve to the process.

If you're overeager to go multi-cloud, you run the risk of picking the wrong clouds for your enterprise.

"If you think spending money, people and time to get deeply embedded in one cloud is hard, what if you pick the second or third one and it's the wrong one, so you have to pick and choose again?" Plummer said.

Enterprises do face a potential downside to cloud providers' constantly evolving platforms. Even if one cloud is a good choice for your workloads now, it doesn't necessarily mean it will continue to be.

Still, even if you pick the wrong cloud, it doesn't mean you should give up, Plummer said. A good multi-cloud strategy will involve some degree of trial and error as you try to identify the best fit for your organization.

More here:
Multi-cloud environments: Explore the pros and cons - TechTarget