When ChatGPT accelerates iteration and continues to create surprises, when many companies enter the game, when the AI ecosystem blooms, and when AI becomes "usable" and "easy to use", an era of AI is gradually approaching. Looking to the future, AI will light up everything, empower thousands of industries, and benefit thousands of households. On April 28, the 2024 China Mobile Computing Network Conference with the theme of "Computing Network Lights Up the New Era of AI" was held in Suzhou, and through thematic forums and exhibitions, China Mobile deeply explored how to empower industrial upgrading and productivity leap in the "AI+" era through computing power networks.
Towards a new stage of computing network 3.0
In 2021, China Mobile put forward the concept of computing power network and planned a "three-stage" implementation path - computing network 1.0 with "ubiquitous collaboration", computing network 2.0 with "integration and unification", and computing network 3.0 with "one endogenous". At this conference, Yang Jie, chairman of China Mobile, said that China Mobile has initially built a computing network with comprehensive leading infrastructure, technical capabilities and product services, successfully completed the set goal of computing network 1.0, fully launched the 2.0 phase of work, and accelerated towards the new stage of 3.0.
The first is to build a computing network infrastructure system. The "4+N+31+X" data center covers all national computing hub nodes, the Hohhot ultra-large-scale single intelligent computing center was selected as one of the "Top Ten Super Projects of Central Enterprises", and the computing power grid-connected platform is connected to the diversified computing power of dozens of partners such as Suzhou Kunshan Supercomputing Center and Bose Quantum. We will build the world's largest "IPv6+" backbone bearer network, realize the large-scale commercial use of the world's first 400G all-optical backbone transmission network, continue to deepen the three-level low-latency computing power service circle, and smooth the artery of "Eastern Data and Western Computing".
The second is to build a key technology system for computing networks. Breakthroughs have been made in original technologies such as computing power routing, computing power native, and fully scheduling Ethernet, and independent innovation achievements such as software and hardware integrated computing architecture, Tianyuan operating system, and Tianchi SDN. We made every effort to promote the research and development of the computing network brain, and officially launched the trial commercial use of the whole network in October last year, with an average daily dispatch of 100 million yuan. He has taken the lead in establishing more than 120 domestic and foreign standards, and established a working group on key technologies of computing power networks in the international authoritative Internet standards organization IETF to promote the original technology of computing and network integration to the world.
The third is to build a computing network product and service system. The revenue of mobile cloud will exceed 80 billion yuan in 2023, an increase of 40 times in 4 years, and its comprehensive strength will rank first among domestic cloud service providers. It has built a "3+2+1" computing terminal product body, with more than 10 million cloud phone users and more than 2.7 million cloud computer sales. It has launched more than 20 task-based service models, such as East Vision and West Rendering, East Data and West Training, and data express delivery.
At this conference, China Mobile revealed that it has built the first batch of 12 intelligent computing centers in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, Yangtze River Delta, Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, Chengdu-Chongqing, Inner Mongolia, Ningxia, Guizhou, Heilongjiang, Shandong, Hubei and other places, with an overall computing power scale of 11EFLOPS, realizing the basic coverage of "Eastern Data and Western Computing" hub nodes.
With the advancement of computing network construction, China Mobile has completed the leapfrog development of "cloud to computing", and the computing network has become the core driving force to promote its transformation and upgrading and achieve high-quality and sustainable development. To this end, China Mobile keeps pace with the times and upgrades the "Mobile Cloud Conference" to the "Computing Network Conference".
Deepen the new features of "ULTRA" computing network
While announcing the acceleration of the new stage of computing network 3.0, China Mobile also said that it will deepen the new "ULTRA" features of the computing network that is "diverse, ubiquitous, intelligent and agile, rich and easy to use, safe and reliable, green and low-carbon", so as to accelerate the large-scale deployment and wide application of computing power networks.
"U" refers to the construction of a new layout of "diversified and ubiquitous" to improve the comprehensive supply level of computing network. China Mobile will continue to promote the upgrading of computing network infrastructure, accelerate the in-depth integration of "East, Mid and West", "Cloud Edge End" and "Tongzhi Super", and continuously consolidate the cornerstone of computing network development. "A" is to build a new center of "intelligence and agility" and build the core advantages of the computing network brain. China Mobile will continue to promote the upgrade of the computing network brain, accelerate the integration of resources in all aspects, such as resource sensing, orchestration and scheduling, and operation services, so as to achieve accurate matching of computing network supply and demand.
"R" refers to building "rich and easy-to-use" new services to support the development of "artificial intelligence+". China Mobile will continue to promote the upgrade of computing network services, with the mobile cloud as the "computing leader", accelerate the intelligent reconstruction of computing base, platform capabilities and product applications, and fully unleash the efficiency of AI innovation.
"T" means building a new barrier of "security and trustworthiness" to help form a high-level security pattern. China Mobile will continue to promote the security upgrade of the computing network, accelerate the construction of a multi-level and three-dimensional security system of "cloud-network-edge-end", and realize the trusted security of the entire computing network.
"L" means to build a new paradigm of "green and low-carbon" and accelerate the realization of sustainable development. China Mobile will continue to promote the green upgrade of computing networks, strengthen the integration and innovation of next-generation information technology and green technology, and accelerate the development of green productivity.
"ULTRA" represents five aspects: infrastructure, business application, computing power scheduling, security and trustworthiness, and green and low-carbon, which are the key elements for the sustainable development of computing power networks.
From the perspective of infrastructure, computing power includes four types of "intelligent overload", and the top priority at present is to achieve a reasonable layout of "intelligent excess"; from the perspective of business applications, computing infrastructure has developed rapidly, while computing power applications are relatively lagging behind, and the next step is to promote the computing network from "channel" to "open traffic"; From the perspective of computing power scheduling, it is necessary to break through the barriers between supply and demand and realize the efficient use of computing power; from the perspective of security and trustworthiness, the unified and intensive data center security prevention system has not yet been fully established, and the integrated security guarantee service capability still needs to be strengthened; from the perspective of green and low-carbon, the current energy consumption of computing power remains high, and in order to achieve the high-quality development of computing power, it is necessary to find a green and energy-saving way.
China Mobile's new computing network "ULTRA" features face the pain points directly, and it is just in time.
Build a big country computing network to support "artificial intelligence +"
With the new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformation, artificial intelligence is being upgraded to an indispensable infrastructure and core capability to support economic and social transformation, accelerating the transformation from "+AI" to "AI+". With the iterative upgrading of artificial intelligence, the demand for computing power behind it has also risen.
According to the data, the parameter size of the first-generation generative pre-trained model GPT-1 is 117 million, GPT-2 has increased to 1.5 billion, GPT-3 has expanded to 175 billion, and GPT-4 has increased to 1.8 trillion. The vigorous development of large models is driving the rapid growth of demand for intelligent computing power, and intelligent computing infrastructure will play an increasingly important role and become a key driving force for industrial upgrading and productivity leap in the "AI+" era.
At present, China Mobile has made small achievements in accelerating the construction of computing networks and lighting up artificial intelligence. For example, the Hohhot ultra-large-scale single intelligent computing center has deployed about 20,000 AI acceleration cards, with a localization rate of more than 85% of AI chips and an intelligent computing power scale of up to 6.7EFLOPS (67 billion floating point operations per second), filling the huge gap in the computing power required for the wide application of artificial intelligence in mainland China.
China Mobile said that it will accelerate its march towards 3.0 and fully support "artificial intelligence +" through "large clusters, large arteries, large hubs, and large industries".
In terms of large clusters, we will build a super factory for AI model training. This year, China Mobile will commercialize three autonomous and controllable 10,000 card clusters in Harbin, Hohhot and Guiyang, with a total scale of nearly 60,000 GPU cards, to fully meet the needs of centralized training of large models, and at the same time deploy inference computing power in 1,500 edge nodes to form an intelligent computing network with "large central clusters, wide distribution at the edge, and integration of training and pushing".
In terms of major arteries, we will build a high-speed information flow of AI data. In the near future, China Mobile will accelerate the opening of 400G high-speed interconnection links between national hub clusters, open up network resilience capabilities, and build a new transportation capacity network with large bandwidth, wide coverage, low latency, and intelligence, so as to further reduce the cost of business migration to the west. In the medium and long term, it will lead the formation of a multi-level converged network solution with "high throughput, low latency, and integration".
In terms of the big center, we will develop the strongest brain for AI task distribution. The computing network brain is a network-based distributed computing task distribution system, and China Mobile will achieve a comprehensive leap in the scheduling capability and intelligence level of the whole network on the basis of last year's trial commercial use.
In terms of large industries, the "tropical rainforest" of AI application innovation will prosper. China Mobile will build a harmonious and thriving industrial ecology by strengthening the foundation of innovation, flourishing the branches and leaves of innovation, and cultivating fertile soil for innovation.
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