Intel Vision 2024: AI Barrage Brings More Channel Opportunity

INTEL VISION 2024 — Held this year in Phoenix, Intel's three-day affair brings together artificial intelligence (AI) experts from near and far. The chipmaking giant disclosed a sweeping plan of attack for placing more AI in the enterprise with a set of open, scalable systems. 

Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger graced the keynote stage for his talk on how the semiconductor chip manufacturer plots to bring "AI Everywhere, Today." 

Gelsinger likewise conveyed that he wants AI to be everywhere across the enterprise, from the PC to the data center to the edge.

"Our latest Gaudi, Xeon and Core Ultra platforms are delivering a cohesive set of flexible solutions tailored to meet the changing needs of our customers and capitalize on the immense opportunities ahead,” the exec said.

As such, Intel launched the Intel Gaudi 3 AI accelerator, a program it says will deliver 50% better inference (on average) and 40% better power efficiency than its key competitor − Nvidia's H100 chip − which Nvidia says is the most advanced chip ever built. 

Intel says it will do so at a mere "fraction of the cost," with the chip giant adding it will offer this via original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) HPE, Lenovo, and Supermicro, with the intent of "broadening the AI data center market offerings for enterprises." 

Also new is a revived round of Intel Gaudi accelerator customers that include heavy-hitters like Bosch, CtrlS, IFF, Landing AI, NAVER, NielsenIQ, Roboflo, and Seekr — partnerships that follow Intel filing operating losses of nearly $7 billion in 2023. It's a figure that rose from a $5.17 billion loss in 2022.

The launch of the new Gaudi3 chip, first announced at the beginning of 2024, will feature upgraded memory, computing and networking capacities than its predecessor. 

With the Ultra Ethernet Consortium, Intel says it will lead "open Ethernet networking" for AI fabrics. It also introduced the AI NIC (network interface card), AI connectivity chiplets for integration into XPUs, Gaudi-based systems and a degree of soft and hard reference AI interconnect designs for Intel Foundry.

The play here, Intel shared, is to create an open platform for enterprise AI to accelerate the deployment of secure GenAI systems enabled by retrieval augmented generation (RAG). 

Intel Vision 2024: Good News for the Channel?

With a focus on bringing more AI into the enterprise space by way of chips, Intel said at its annual customer and partner showcase that it will not sacrifice the integrity of its security efforts while doing so.

That is likely music to the ears of partners and customers who hoped this round of product launches would be as robust as Intel has created in the past.

Andy Marsee, general manager of the Intel Partner Alliance Experience, told Channel Futures the firm was proud to announce the expansion of the Intel Partner Alliance AI Accelerator initiative to include companies building generative AI and AI PC applications, and a new Intel Partner Alliance Industry Solution Builders initiative, enabling partners and end users across key verticals to drive industry transformation and generate new business opportunities."

You may recall that in January, Intel hired a new channel leader, Trevor Vickers, who will lead the company’s global partners and support organization. He is likely more than eager at the prospect of getting these technologies unveiled at Intel Vision 2024 into the hands of partners looking to take organizations on the new AI-fueled enterprise journey. 

A report by cybersecurity giant Zscaler found that from April 2023 to January 2024, enterprise AI usage "skyrocketed by 595% ," with that number only expected to grow.