Yadro will produce processors without IBM technology
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Server manufacturer Yadro, which had exclusive access to the development of the American IBM Power processor architecture, left the profile consortium. The company switches to the development of processors on the open RISC-V architecture. It is still at the initial stage of development, and servers or data storage systems on Power met high standards, experts say. But the authorities are discussing a ban on parallel imports of IBM products, and customers will have to switch to servers from other vendors.
Kommersant discovered that all mention of Yadro (part of ICS Holding) disappeared from the website of the OpenPower Foundation (OPF; organized by American IBM, Google, Nvidia, Israeli Mellanox Technologies and Taiwanese Tyan). According to the Wayback Machine, she was a “platinum member” at the end of March, and CTO Artem Ikoev was one of the members of the board of directors. OPF did not respond to the Kommersant request.
As part of the OpenPower Foundation, IBM provided members of the consortium with access to the joint development of the Power processor architecture (included in the category of RISC architectures, which occupies more than 40% of the world market). On its basis, Yadro developed and produced Vesnin servers and a line of Tatlin data storage systems. The company’s solutions are used, among other things, by telecom operators to implement the Yarovaya Law. Equipment is also supplied to government agencies: for example, at the end of March, Rosreestr bought servers of the company for 194.3 million rubles.
Yadro explained to Kommersant that they had decided to change the company’s participation in the consortium “due to obvious organizational difficulties in maintaining a high pace of further joint work and taking into account the strategic long-term choice in favor of the RISC-V architecture.” In 2019, the company bought 51% of the developer of processors based on this architecture, Syntacore (see “Kommersant” dated November 5, 2019). After the outbreak of hostilities in Ukraine, the United States included in the SDN list the Yadro production in Dubna, which had not yet been launched (Yadro Fab Dubna LLC; see Kommersant on September 15). Later, the parent KNS Group LLC and the direct owner of Yadro ICS Holding were included in the black list (see Kommersant dated February 25).
RISC-V – open processor architecture, the project was created by the University of California at Berkeley. It can be used freely and free of charge, including for commercial implementation. So far, RISC-V is used for low-performance ancillary solutions, but it is expected that such processors will be able to compete with chips based on popular x86 and ARM architectures. Last fall, Aquarius negotiated with Russian suppliers of IP blocks for RISC-V and recruited a development team for the production of electronics. The company expected to receive a subsidy from the Ministry of Industry and Trade. The prospects of technology were also studied by F+ tech. But so far, no one is producing equipment on this architecture in Russia.
At the end of 2021, according to IDC, Yadro ranked third in the Russian server market in real terms after Dell and HPE. In 2022, the supply of servers, data storage systems (DSS), computers and spare parts for computers decreased by 15%, to $6.6 billion, the physical volume of imports decreased by 24%, to about 41 million devices (see “Kommersant” from 2 June). An interlocutor in the electronics market suggests that after the start of the military operation, Yadro bought IBM equipment to form a reserve. In parallel, she began to revise the timing of the release of new products – “server and storage lines that were supposed to be released in 2023 are announced for the first quarter of 2024.”
Yadro had an exclusive supply of servers based on IBM processors in Russia. “It has always been difficult to enter into a partnership with an American vendor, and the company began to localize it in the country more than ten years ago,” three Kommersant interlocutors on the market say. The Rikor holding also announced plans to start developing the OpenPower processor in 2015. But now he makes equipment on the X86 architecture, the site says. In “Ricore” they did not answer “Kommersant”.
Membership in OPF also made it possible to receive technical support for equipment from IBM, Maxim Koposov, director of Promobit, emphasizes, “the likelihood that Yadro will be able to continue developing its equipment on IBM technologies after the imposition of sanctions is extremely low.” He notes that the offer on Power processors was “unique in the Russian market.”
Against the backdrop of the fact that the Ministry of Industry and Trade is now discussing a ban on parallel imports to Russia of products of foreign brands, including IBM, Dell, HPE (see Kommersant of June 2), the demand for stocks of equipment based on IBM technologies may grow, the interlocutor of Kommersant believes ” in the data processing market. “But subsequently, customers will have to switch to equipment, such as the X86, which is produced and supplied by more Russian manufacturers, including Aquarius,” he says. The company did not answer “Kommersant”.
Servers or storage systems on the Power architecture made it possible to “comply with the world standard of equipment with more RAM and high speed of the equipment than on the X86 architecture,” says Pavel Kulakov, founder of the data center and cloud provider Oxygen. The Power architecture has been on the market for more than one year, it has passed all stages of testing and improvement, while RISC-V is “at the initial stage of development, and it will take five to ten years to achieve a similar level,” confirms a Kommersant source on the market. He adds that the RISC-V community may also have questions about the participation of Russian companies, because among its founders are American organizations, including IBM.
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