IBM partners with AMD to collaborate on AI, HPC, and Confidential Computing
IBM and AMD have announced a new multi-year joint development agreement in a bid to enhance and extend the security and artificial intelligence (AI) offerings of both companies.
According to a statement, the joint development agreement will expand this vision by building upon open source software, open standards, and open system architectures to drive Confidential Computing in hybrid cloud environments and support a broad range of accelerators across high-performance computing (HPC), and enterprise critical capabilities such as virtualisation and encryption.
"The commitment of AMD to technological innovation aligns with our mission to develop and accelerate the adoption of the hybrid cloud to help connect, secure and power our digital world," says Dario Gil, director of IBM Research.
"IBM is focused on giving our clients choice, agility and security in our hybrid cloud offerings through advanced research, development and scaling of new technologies," he says.
Mark Papermaster, executive vice president and chief technology officer at AMD, says, "This agreement between AMD and IBM aligns well with our long-standing commitment to collaborating with leaders in the industry.
"AMD is excited to extend our work with IBM on artificial intelligence, accelerating data center workloads, and improving security across the cloud," he says.
For many companies, securing highly sensitive data still remains a challenge. Cybersecurity is currently the top barrier for adoption as well as the top criteria for selection of cloud providers, according to data from IBM's Institute for Business value.
According to analyst firm Gartner, Confidential Computing potentially removes the remaining barrier to hybrid cloud adoption for highly regulated businesses or any organisation concerned about unauthorised third-party access to data in use in the public cloud.
Confidential Computing is a technology, enabled by hardware, that allows the data associated with a running virtual machine (VM) to be encrypted, including while workloads are running. This capability helps prevent would-be attackers and bad actors from accessing confidential information, even in the event of a break-in.
"Confidential Computing for hybrid cloud unlocks new potential for enterprise adoption of hybrid cloud computing, especially in regulated industries such as finance, healthcare and insurance."
Engagement between AMD and IBM researchers on joint development activities under the agreement is now underway.
In October, IBM announced the expansion of its partnership agreement with ServiceNow, in a bid to help companies reduce operational risk and lower costs by applying AI to automate IT operations.
Available later this year, a new joint solution will combine IBMs AI-powered hybrid cloud software and professional services to ServiceNows intelligent workflow capabilities and market-leading IT service and operations management products.
