Chinese Sophgo plans to start supplying its solutions to Russian computer manufacturers

Russian manufacturers of computer equipment told Kommersant that the Chinese developer of processors for neural networks, Sophgo, is offering them the creation of joint products. Market participants doubt the effectiveness of such cooperation, although the Russian Federation does not yet have its own developments in this direction. Experts believe that Sophgo’s solutions may be of interest not only to electronics vendors, but also to companies developing artificial intelligence technologies in general.

The Chinese developer of tensor processors (belonging to the neural class) Sophgo plans to start supplying its solutions to Russian manufacturers of computer equipment, a source in the electronics market told Kommersant. According to him, in January the Chinese vendor began sending proposals to market participants for cooperation and the creation of a joint product based on their processor. “The company offers to officially supply tensor processors for neural networks, as well as central processors of its own design on the open Risc-V architecture,” he adds.

The Sophgo website says that the company develops and produces microservers, modules and processors based on the open Risc-V architecture. It has more than ten research centers in China and other countries. The company did not respond to Kommersant’s request.

Director of Norsi-Trans (produces servers, storage systems) Sergei Ovchinnikov told Kommersant that he knows about Sophgo’s attempts to enter into partnerships with Russian equipment developers. At the same time, according to him, the Chinese supplier does not have motherboards developed for Russian solutions: “In this case, domestic vendors will have to develop components from scratch, which will take at least two years and several billion rubles.”

A source among electronics manufacturers is also skeptical about Sophgo’s proposal, since, according to him, these types of processors are primarily suitable for microservers and network equipment: “Now in the Russian Federation, solutions based on x86 and ARM, which have a more developed an ecosystem of ready-made solutions.”

At the beginning of October, Kommersant reported that another Chinese processor developer, Loongson, began supplying its solutions for Russian computing technology. Then experts noted that this threatens the dependence of domestic electronics on Chinese processors (see Kommersant on October 9).

Kommersant’s interlocutor among manufacturers believes that this risk is also relevant for tensor processors: “Russian vendors are waiting for the development of domestic chips.” IVA Technologies, part of the Hitech group, announced the development of a tensor processor back in 2018, but it never reached the final product. The company declined to comment.

Sophgo mainly deals with processors for accelerating artificial intelligence; the company has its own algorithm for its operation, explains Oleg Izumrudov, director of RosSHD (a consortium of Russian developers of data storage systems). According to him, similar solutions are produced by Nvidia, Intel and AMD. “Currently, the artificial intelligence market is at an early stage of development, as is the development of tensor processors for this technology,” he explains, adding that in the world market there is no single leader and standard in the field of software algorithms and hardware accelerators, so Chinese and American developers “ have the same prospects.”

Among the potential clients of Chinese tensor processors there may also be companies involved in the development of artificial intelligence, a Kommersant source says.

But VisionLabs CEO Dmitry Markov emphasizes that Sophgo products are intended only for neural network models, while Nvidia or Intel processors make it possible to train neural networks using their solutions: “Processors from Sophgo may be of interest to Russian developers for running neural networks, but there are available alternatives.” Among those who may be interested in using Sophgo solutions in the Russian Federation, Mr. Izumrudov named Yandex and Sber (both companies did not answer Kommersant), since they use AI technologies in their products.

Timofey Kornev