The Ghost is out of HPE’s The Machine: Page 2 of 2

Business Implications of The Machine

What are the business implications of such a revolutionary product, we asked Bresniker.

“Memory-Driven Computing will power innovations across a vast spectrum of business and societal applications, from Artificial Intelligence and Cognitive Computing to medical research, smart cities and transportation,” said Bresniker.

“It will also enable a massive and essential leap in processing performance and allow us to develop new ways to extract knowledge and insights from large, complex data sources.”

According to him, Memory-Driven Computing will take a variety of forms in the marketplace and could be built into many different types of devices. For instance, Memory-Driven Computing could completely change the way we research, prescribe, track and use medicine. Imagine if doctors could diagnose and treat complex maladies by instantly tapping the collective medical knowledge of humanity, rather than relying on their own limited expertise!

“HPE is working with customers, partners and industry leaders alike to set the stage for what Memory-Driven Computing will enable and to better envision its full potential” he said.

Air travel presents another use case scenario, said Bresniker. Memory-Driven Computing systems will allow airlines to optimize everything to maximize on-time flights by having control of every state of the plane, and the operations associated with it, avoiding delays. It can simulate likely disruptions and store an almost infinite series of “what-ifs” so airlines can easily look up the scenario and immediately know what to do.

“HPE is future-proofing today’s technologies to be compatible with Memory-Driven Computing technologies. The component technologies resulting from this research will be designed to be compatible to support customers’ existing environments. Memory-Driven Computing component technologies will be introduced across HPE’s product portfolio,” he said.

From prototype to product

When we asked Bresniker when The Machine will be available in the market, specifically in Asia, he said, “HPE will preview a prototype of The Machine, the first example of HPE’s Memory-Driven architecture by the end of this year.” And it did organise a demo of the prototype in early December.

However, on 29 November, The Register from the UK ran a story on The Machine in which it claimed that HPE’s ‘proof-of-concept prototype of their fairytale memory-focused computer, The Machine’ is a ‘bittersweet achievement’, and that HPE’s management has decided to ‘step back from manufacturing and selling the much-hyped fabled device as a complete system’.

The report said that ‘The Machine will not emerge from the labs as an official product any time soon’ and ‘instead, it will be cannibalized and its technologies sprinkled into HPE products over the remainder of the decade and possibly beyond’.

In an email follow up, Bresniker had pretty much indicated this to us (on 14 October 2016) but in a different context: “As HPE continues to develop the component technologies of this system, we are accelerating the ability to bring innovations to market as soon as they are commercially viable. HPE is embedding these technologies into our current product roadmap and has already released a number of products and partnerships on the road to Memory-Driven Computing. This includes the HPE ProLiant Gen9 DL385 server with HPE Persistent Memory, a collaboration with Hortonworks focused on improving the Spark big data analytics platform by enabling it to take advantage of large memory systems, and a partnership with SanDisk to create non-volatile memory technology.”

In a recent blog on HPE, Christina Lee, senior marketing and communications manager, The Machine, also clarified that “The Machine is not a device, like a new Mac. The form factor itself is not limited. A Memory-Driven platform that uses universal, persistent memory can be expressed as everything from a data centre, to a server to a cell phone to a node on a car. So, I have to turn this question to “This is what’s next.” The sneak peek into the first iteration of The Machine is an expression of first signs of life and how everything is working together as a new computing platform we call Memory-Driven Computing.”

In addition, Bresniker said that HPE has also announced its participation with the new Gen-Z Consortium, an industry alliance working to create and commercialize a new scalable computing interconnect and protocol. HPE intends to use Gen-Z to create high-performance memory fabrics that can rapidly access large volumes of data while lowering costs and reducing energy consumption.

While the ghost is out of HPE’s The Machine, its impact and full potential remains to be seen and experienced by the industry at large.

(Zafar Anjum is DNA's Contributing Editor in Singapore) 
 
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