
Jensen Huang’s vision for data center dominance may destroy the Arm ecosystem - kasabali
https://semianalysis.com/jensen-huangs-vision-for-data-center-dominance-will-destroy-the-arm-ecosystem/
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Spooky23
This story is pretty hilarious in its breathless hype factor. Nvidia is going
to dominate the datacenter with the three legged stool of GPUs, Inifiband and
ARM?

Sounds like the bullshit that IBM salespeople were peddling about POWER circa
2008. The real strategy was licensing capacity with physical segmentation.
Nvidia would probably pursue a similar strategy -- sell chips with lots and
lots of cores and lease capacity on demand.

You could pave a road with the gravestones of technology vendors who pursued
industry dominance with faster, more expensive chips. If IBM, Sun, Unisys, HP,
Digital, SGI and a dozen others failed, why would a company with almost zero
datacenter presence succeed?

Even with the pitiful state of 2020 Intel, I'd put my money on commodity
ethernet and x86 in the datacenter. Most datacenter architecture doesn't
require GPU. Nvidia could market with a kick-ass Oracle-like engineered
solution for high-performance compute, game hosting or AI. But I don't think
Oracle moved the needle in how we buy database compute, and I doubt Nvidia
would do so here.

~~~
baybal2
> You could pave a road with the gravestones of technology vendors who pursued
> industry dominance with faster, more expensive chips. If IBM, Sun, Unisys,
> HP, Digital, SGI and a dozen others failed, why would a company with almost
> zero datacenter presence succeed?

I have very much the same opinion, and I think that Huang is at least aware of
that.

> Nvidia would probably pursue a similar strategy -- sell chips with lots and
> lots of cores and lease capacity on demand.

But this will be pretty much the same IBM thing. Some banks, and Oracle/SAP
buyer types may buy in, but that will be it. It does not change anything to
how the companies in the above list of "big iron" vendors attempted to do it
before.

I want to remind that Huang is also, a very big "investment relations" player,
and he likes to make an impression of "grandiose" plans to impressionable
investor guys.

~~~
mrandish
> impressionable investor guys.

Impressionable investor guys tend not to be investor guys for very long. Big-
vision bluster can can work with media and some end users but it turns off
real market analysts.

~~~
andromeduck
Seems to be working fine for Elon, Miyoshi Son & gang.

~~~
pas
Elon seems to have delivered as opposed to Son, no?

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MangoCoffee
>The datacenter is a 3 legged stool, and the remaining missing piece is a CPU.
AMD, Intel, and various hyperscalers are also working to build out their own
3-legged stool.

Intel/AMD is allowed to build a moat in data center but Nvidia can't(?)

>Nvidia’s endgame isn’t more revenue from licensing costs. Their endgame is a
fully vertically integrated data center provider. They will want to make and
control every part of the three legged stool. This means they slowly destroy
the idea of Neoverse. Whether through making that IP extremely costly, or
having their own in house designs be a generation ahead, Nvidia will build a
moat around Arm server CPUs. Over time, Jensen Huang will muscle out other Arm
vendors

Intel doesn't even licensed out x86. AMD is grandfathered in. So Intel is
allowed to control x86 but Nvidia can't. this is like Oracle bought MySQL
along with Sun and Michael Widenius cry about it. You know what you are doing
when you sold MySql to Sun. another company can come along to buy it. this is
what closed ecosystem/software does. MySql is saved by dual licenses so maybe
its time to ditch this idea of building an ecosystem on closed
hardware/software.

~~~
wmf
x86 has been (effectively) a duopoly for over 20 years but breaking the ARM
ecosystem would be a new thing. Building a moat is one thing but privatizing
an existing ecosystem is different.

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klelatti
Nvidia already has the ability to build world beating data-center products
using the three 'legs' of GPU (where it already dominates), the Mellanox
technology it's acquired and Arm CPUs (where of course with an architecture
license its free to improve on existing Arm designs). It already has a
potential moat by virtue of its unique access to these three technologies
together.

So why would it pay $30bn+ to own Arm? Because it would have the ability to
directly hinder the businesses (and customers) of its current and potential
competitors who have invested in the development of Arm based products. Not
just in the data center but in mobile and in products that are used by
billions of people around the world. That can't be right.

~~~
fermienrico
> it would have the ability to directly hinder the businesses

They have _extensive_ contracts in place. It's not like ARM instruction set is
provided to nVidia and then they can just revoke it because they don't like
nVidia.

~~~
monocasa
I think the parent is saying that the only value add for Nvidia to purchase
ARM itself rather than just purchasing an architectural licence is to use ARM
in an anticompetitive way.

~~~
rubber_duck
That's not much of a value gain it would just push the industry further away
from ARM. x86 has a lot of legacy power and it enjoyed being the only relevant
platform for a long time in a lot of markets so there's a lot of cost in
making stuff that was architecture specific cross platform. ARM doesn't really
have that, people that deal with ARM already have to worry about
infrastructure set portability (all of them also have x86 support) once you
add ARM the way is open for other ISA

~~~
kelnos
> _That 's not much of a value gain it would just push the industry further
> away from ARM._

I think that's the big irony here. It's taken ARM decades to break out of
embedded/mobile and get to the point where they're seriously considered for
workstation or server use. If Nvidia were to acquire ARM it would likely
antagonize everyone to the point where they'd rush back to x86 and Nvidia
would gain nothing.

~~~
toxik
That ship sailed already, Apple selling laptops with ARM processors is a sign
of the times here.

~~~
kelnos
Apple is still a very small part of the market when it comes to laptops and
desktops. Their ARM-based computers will be a tiny drop in the bucket when
stacked against mobile ARM chipsets. Sure, I expect PC vendors to jump on the
ARM train as well, but if the sale to Nvidia happens, that could stop before
it gets into full swing, or not happen at all. I'm sure PC makers who are
thinking about ARM are watching this deal very carefully, and are avoiding
jumping too soon.

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discodave
> The rational for purchasing Arm seems ridiculous to many, but Jensen’s
> vision is for the datacenter being a computer and Nvidia being the one to
> build it.

The thing is, there are 3 companies that control the future of datacenter
growth. Amazon, Microsoft and Google. They can move the industry to RISC-V if
NVidia doesn't play ball, or convince Intel to manufacture on TSMC's process.

Nvidia won't be in a particularly strong negotiating position. My
understanding is that lots of ARM licenses are perpetual, or very broad. The
existing players can just keep making ARM chips, what can NVidia do to extract
more money from them, new instructions?

~~~
mytailorisrich
China is having issues with Arm and has a strategic view to develop its
domestic industry. This alone means that a significant challenger to Arm will
rise.

~~~
mrweasel
Interesting point, I don't believe I've heard about Chinese ARM processor, but
I do know that China has MIPS based processors, and they're using VIAs license
to build x86 chips.

~~~
baybal2
There was a drama at ARM China recently. The fired, but de-jure still acting
CEO was caught self dealing with his own obscure fund company, some times with
clients' assistance.

IMHO, it simply looked like he was was quietly moving out cash from the
company.

------
kanox
So the fear here is that nvidia becomes a major provider of arm-based server
chips and the rest of the arm ecosystem is forced to move to risc-v?

Both of these events would be very positive for the industry.

~~~
justin66
> the rest of the arm ecosystem is forced to move to risc-v?

In addition to selling hardware, it seems like ARM-owning Nvidia would
probably be happy to sell whatever amazing new ARM cores they cook up to
whoever is willing to pay to use the design. It's not obvious RISC-V will
benefit from any of this. Somebody, somewhere would need to create equally
amazing RISC-V cores and find a way to sell them.

~~~
pjmlp
So far RISC-V market is still wishful thinking, beyond a couple of maker
boards.

First get C, C++, Go, Rust, Java, Erlang, .NET,.... generating competitive
native code, port all their main libraries and IDE tooling, and then it might
stand a chance.

~~~
jlokier
RISC-V is far past "couple of maker boards" now. The last year has seen a lot
of activity.

You're right that a number of mainstream software packages are still work in
progress, for example V8 doesn't target it yet.

But RISC-V is thriving in other areas like industrial controllers, and Alibaba
Cloud just announced a few days ago they are using it in a new server
processor, positioned as an eventual competitor to AWS Graviton.

Topically: Nvidia uses RISC-V in some GPUs as a controller (not the GPU core).
Not sure if those are released yet, but they gave a presentation on it at a
recent RISC-V meet-up.

~~~
pjmlp
Point is, how much use do those controllers get versus more traditional CPU
with years of mature ecosystem, so far it looks like testing waters to me, not
something that even PIC has to worry about.

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alynn
> With the US Department of Energy dumping money into SCYL and many in the
> industry congregating around it, the software front is accelerating rapidly.

Anybody know what SCYL is? Based on the low number of google hits I'm thinking
it's a typo

~~~
zdw
I would assume [https://www.khronos.org/sycl/](https://www.khronos.org/sycl/)

------
m0zg
I hope this leads to serious interest in RISC-V ecosystem. It's been what, a
decade? And we still don't have a cheap Raspberry-Pi like board.

------
bitxbit
I simply do not understand current demand for data centers and more
specifically GPU/ASIC. Are companies really squeezing that much out of data to
justify this level of investments?

~~~
ahmedalsudani
Have you looked at Google’s earnings? ;)

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x86_64Ubuntu
The text and background makes it hard to read.

------
lowdose
We should put a cap on M&A activities concerning more than 100 people on the
payroll on either side.

------
coldtea
Speaking of RISC-V, does RISC-V have any real traction?

Not niche traction and announcements here and there, actual heavy
investments...

Or is it more like an "open arch" fantasy thing, kind of the cpu analogous to
Ogg Vorbis and Open Moko?

~~~
HeadsUpHigh
Western Digital is using it on their hdd controllers. SiFive licenses IP for
big cores and China apparently plans to work with it in the future.

Also I don't know why you count Ogg Vorbis as a fantasy kind of thing, it's
used for pretty much any conference app and it has support on most consumer
hardware and softwware for playback. Programs like EAC and dbpoweramp support
it. I use it for my music collection on my phone, at half the size of mp3 it
sounds completely transparent to me with my earbuds.

~~~
coldtea
> _Also I don 't know why you count Ogg Vorbis as a fantasy kind of thing,
> it's used for pretty much any conference app and it has support on most
> consumer hardware and softwware for playback._

The idea in the day was it would replace mp3/aac/etc which it obviously
didn't. That players support it is also not a mark of great success, since
most people don't and won't care to use it. It just means that for the rare
person caring enough, it will work.

From that aspect, the fact that conference apps use it as the internal format
is hardly relevant, they could license and use whatever and we wouldn't know
any difference.

~~~
HeadsUpHigh
>The idea in the day was it would replace mp3/aac/etc which it obviously
didn't.

It did for anyone that cares about it and about file size. My portable library
is vorbis. Mp3 is just very popular and there are a lot of mp3 files out there
that can't be converted without further degradation of the sound quality so
mp3 will remain relevant for a long time.

>From that aspect, the fact that conference apps use it as the internal format
is hardly relevant, they could license and use whatever and we wouldn't know
any difference.

It's relevant in terms of market support. Vorbis isn't going anywhere. The
random codecs that have popped over the years, open or proprietary never got a
lot of support from other companies so they went away.

------
geogra4
Me being negative really I think there is significant push for an American
company to purchase ARM so that Chinese companies can no longer license the
ISA?

~~~
baybal2
"ARM China" has got perpetual licensing rights from ARM Co. in China. This is
how they keep licensing to Huawei.

------
ilaksh
Its not about Huang. Its the structure of the markets and companies that makes
this an obvious anti-trust problem.

------
exikyut
The way the title of this was phrased made a little lightbulb go on:

What if Intel asked NVIDIA to buy ARM?

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jjtheblunt
Is there a corollary to Betteridge's Law, asserting that titles with a
subjunctive verb from the set {may,might,could} also evaluate to false?

([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headline...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headlines))

------
xvilka
NVIDIA is famous for row of anticompetitive practices. On the other hand such
a disaster will clear up the road for other, more modern alternatives - be it
RISC-V or something entirely new.

~~~
yissp
Godwin's law (or Godwin's rule of Hitler analogies) is an Internet adage
asserting that "as an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a
comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1".

~~~
xvilka
Yeah, was a bit too much. Edited.

------
crb002
[https://oxide.computer/](https://oxide.computer/) has a simple mission. Build
hyperscale racks with open firmware/drivers - cut the wasted components like
HDMI ports that Dell/HP still throw on racks by default.
ARM/RISCV/x86/GPU/TPU/storage ... those are just configuration options.

Companies like Lightedge will take on the HVAC and physical security. The
future is chiplets and computational memory:
[https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Michael_Stumm/publicati...](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Michael_Stumm/publication/3250200_Computational_RAM_implementing_processors_in_memory_Des_Test_Comput_161_32-41/links/02e7e530f8ffbdec94000000/Computational-
RAM-implementing-processors-in-memory-Des-Test-Comput-161-32-41.pdf)

~~~
otoburb
>> _ARM /RISCV/x86/GPU/TPU/storage ... those are just configuration options._

But ISA still matters. Switching from Intel to AMD likely isn't much of a
switch, but switching to a different ISA _in the datacenter_ will continue to
be an uphill battle.

As the article notes, the uphill battle will take longer for RISC-V and if
Nvidia follows the strategy laid out they hope to profit in the intervening
gap.

~~~
skissane
> but switching to a different ISA in the datacenter will continue to be an
> uphill battle.

It really depends on what kind of stuff the datacenter runs.

I know of datacenters where almost all the code running is Java. For those
kind of datacenters, so long as JDK supports ARM (which it does), I can't see
why it would be such an uphill battle.

The uphill battle is really for sites who run lots of closed source COTS
software, especially that which is written in C/C++/etc, where moving to ARM
needs support from the vendors and the vendors might hesitate due to the
amount of work involved. There are sites where close to everything is either
open-source or else developed in-house in managed languages (Java, .Net,
Python, Ruby, PHP, JavaScript, etc), and those sites are likely to find it a
lot easier.

~~~
Androider
Even running an interpreted language we've found that there's just a hundred
small papercuts when it comes to switching over to an ARM distro. Missing
native modules, third party deps, even some shell scripts mysteriously not
working properly. Over time this will hopefully ease, and having all
developers on Mac using ARM will help massively, but right now there's just
enough friction to make it not quite worth it.

~~~
skissane
> even some shell scripts mysteriously not working properly

I'm wondering how this could happen.

I'm guessing the script is using uname to detect the platform, and gets
confused by Linux on ARM.

I used to see a lot of shell scripts which detected Linux vs Solaris vs AIX vs
HP-UX and did different things on each, especially due to differences in what
commands and options are available. Given those commercial Unices are now
shadows of their former selves, you don't see that so much any more.

But I still see it in scripts that have to run on both macOS and Linux. I've
even written a few of those scripts recently.

This shouldn't be an issue, though, if you just do `uname -s` – you should get
e.g. `Linux` on both ARM and x86. Maybe some people, for whatever reason, are
checking `uname -p` or `uname -m` instead or as well, or even trying to parse
the output of `uname -a` – not a very good practice

~~~
vertex-four
Ehh, once you get to a certain point you wind up poking things under /sys and
/proc that are a little different per-architecture, or building snippets of C
code that make syscalls which behave differently per-architecture. Not to
mention that ARM distros are usually a little different, either lagging behind
or a little ahead of what exists for x86 - although it's better than it used
to be, especially with ARM64.

