Huawei's Next-Generation 400GE Data Center Switch Empowers New Infrastructure and Creates New Drivers of Growth

[Shenzhen, China, July 24, 2020] With the theme of "400G New Engine: Powering New Infrastructure for New Growth Drivers" at a new product launch conference, Huawei launched CloudEngine 16800 — a next-generation 400GE data center switch. Standing out with the industry-leading new platform, new optical interfaces, and new intelligence capabilities, CloudEngine 16800 delivers super capacity, intelligent experience, and autonomous driving needed for enabling efficient collaboration between different domains of the new infrastructure and accelerating industrial digital transformation.

Kevin Hu, President of Huawei's Data Communication Product Line, launches CloudEngine 16800, a next-generation 400GE data center switch

The pervasive use of 5G and IoT in the new infrastructure and the fast development of cloud and AI technologies drive explosive growth of computing power requirements. This catalyzes the computing power infrastructure such as data centers and intelligent computing centers to require the support of next-generation 400GE large-scale data center networks. However, it is widely known that the packet loss rate of 1‰ on a traditional data center network causes 50% of AI computing power loss. As such, a next-generation intelligent and lossless data center network is required for data centers. In addition, with the expansion of data centers, SDN delivers only deployment automation, and such a limitation is widely recognized. For this reason, a new intelligent O&M solution with full automation is urgently needed for data centers.

Kevin Hu, President of Huawei's Data Communication Product Line, said, "To address new challenges, the next-generation data center network in the intelligence era must have three distinct features: super capacity, intelligent experience, and autonomous driving."

Super Capacity: Industry's Highest Density 768 x 400GE, Assisting in Massive Computing Power

In terms of hardware, Huawei CloudEngine 16800 next-generation 400GE data center switch has made technical breakthroughs in ultimate engineering, high-speed transmission loss, and power consumption per gigabit of data. A single CloudEngine 16800 provides the industry's largest 768-port 400GE switching capacity. In terms of software, Huawei has made technical breakthroughs in automatic configuration, routing protocols, and intelligent data analysis. With all these breakthroughs, CloudEngine 16800 improves device integration and network visualization, matching needs of increased computing power of next-generation data centers and ultra-large-scale networking in the intelligence era. In scenarios such as the computing cloud, the next-generation 400GE large-scale networking facilitates service communication and greatly improves the return on investment (ROI) in computing.

In addition, Huawei and China Telecommunication Technology Labs (CTTL) jointly announced that Huawei's next-generation flagship data center switch CloudEngine 16800 fully configured with 768 400GE ports has been strictly tested in snake-like networking. This is the largest 400GE test in the industry, demonstrating the industry-leading 400GE performance of Huawei CloudEngine 16800.

Based on optical components, new optical interfaces of CloudEngine 16800 have made technical breakthroughs in multi-layer integrated circuits, intelligent optical engine for signal processing, and intelligent fault prediction. CloudEngine 16800 reduces the transmission energy consumption of 400GE optical modules by 15%, increases the transmission distance 5-fold, and proactively identifies 90% of optical link risks, keeping the computing power always available.

Intelligent Experience: Industry's Only Zero-Packet-Loss Next-Generation 400GE Data Center Switch Improves Computing Power by 27%

Huawei CloudEngine 16800 uses innovative intelligent lossless (iLossless) algorithm to achieve zero packet loss on the network, improving data computing efficiency by 27% and data storage efficiency by 30%, and ensuring service experience. In addition, the next-generation intelligent and lossless data center network integrates computing, storage, and service networks, reducing the TCO by 30%. Currently, intelligent and lossless networks with zero packet loss have been deployed in more than 100 data centers around the world.

Autonomous Driving: Industry's Only L3 Autonomous Driving Data Center Network, Reducing hOPEX by 43%

To cope with the exponential growth of data center scale brought by 400GE deployment, Huawei CloudEngine 16800 — a next-generation 400GE data center switch — implements the industry's only L3 full-lifecycle autonomous driving data center network based on intelligent O&M. The autonomous driving network can detect faults within 1 minute, locate faults within 3 minutes, and rectify faults within 5 minutes, predicting unknown faults, improving the automatic fault locating rate to 98%, and ultimately reducing the OPEX by 43%.

As such, CloudEngine 16800 — a next-generation 400GE data center switch — comes in. Built on a new platform, new optical interfaces, and new intelligence capabilities, this innovation-rich switch can open up more service innovations in 400GE scenarios."

With more than 20 years of solid track record in the IP network field, Huawei never ceases to innovate and provide highly competitive intelligent IP network products and solutions to serve carriers and enterprise customers in the finance, government, transportation, and energy industries in more than 100 countries. Huawei's CloudEngine 16800 will help customers accelerate digital transformation and build a fully connected, intelligent world.