IBM在微处理器领域的背水一战

IBM日前宣布与Google、Nvidia等公司共组OpenPower联盟(OpenPower Consortium)，为联盟合作伙伴提供 Power架构。由于这项决定对于蓝色巨人的未来发展影响举足轻重，OpenPower联盟可能成为IBM在微处理器领域的最后生存之战。 几 年前，IBM公司与摩托罗拉(Motorola)共组 PowerPC 联盟，挑战当时以英特尔为主的PC市场。后来英特尔在此市场胜出，几家合作伙伴又成立 Power.org 开放标准联盟进军嵌入式市场。最近，包括LSI、飞思卡尔(Freescale)等嵌入式合作伙伴正纷纷转移到 ARM 核心。 在 IBM最后一搏期望在中国建立 Power 架构的影响力后，Power.org似乎也正悄悄地消失中。IBM还联合Sony与东芝等公司共同推出 Cell多核心处理器拓展游戏机市场，其强大的客制化游戏机处理器曾经是这家蓝色巨人处理器技术与利润的重要推动力。曾几何时，包括微软 Xbox One 和Sony Playstation 4 都开始使用AMD的核心。 如今，IBM准备捍卫其主要战场──高阶服务器。然而，这一次同样也面临挑战。 包括Amazon、Facebook、Google与微软(Microsoft)等业界巨擘最近正大规模扩展资料中心，带动伺器技术及数量的大幅成长。目前 业界采用 x86 结合精简设计的服务器架构风格，正与IBM强调为银行、政府与科学研究等传统客户带来垂直扩展的架构不同。 即使是在500大超级计算机排名中，IBM采用 Nvidia GPU 搭配 x86机架的设计也较水平扩展型设计处于不利地位。如今，英特尔挟其自行开发的多核心 Xeon Phi 来势汹汹，据称可提供比 Nvidia GPU 更高的性能、更低成本以及更易于开发。 Amazon最近还与美国中情局(CIA)签订一项协议，这更进一步侵蚀了IBM一向重要的联邦系统业务领域。如同其它企业一样，政府也面对着采用Amazon等云端服务来降低成本的压力。 目前的情势看来的确不利于IBM。但IBM的优势之一在于说服了Google共同加入OpenPower联盟。只是Google究竟打算用 Power 芯片来开发什么仍不清楚。 无 论如何这场竞赛才刚开始。IBM预计将在今年年底前发布更多家参与 OpenPower 联盟的合作伙伴。也就是说，这个联盟还需要重要的 Power 服务器制造商参与，使该架构得以拥有广泛的支持成员基础，才能确保其长久可行。大型银行与政府实验室也将继续长久使用IBM的大型主机与服务器。 但如果 Power 架构的经济规模无法持续提升，那么IBM的管理团队将面临艰难的选择。特别是当产业逐渐接近 CMOS 微缩的最后几个节点时，他们将在任何半导体的投资报酬率越来越严峻之际做出不得已的决定。 IBM向来以软件与服务来赚钱，但这些产品都与其 Power 架构以及专有的大型主机硬件密不可分。如果芯片与设备变得难以为继时，IBM很可能会萎缩成较小型的IT公司。 IBM过去曾经多次在濒临险境中化险为夷。我没法预测未来会如何，但我认为这一次，该公司将投入更多努力来扭转命运。 本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载 编译：Susan Hong 参考英文原文：IBM's Last Stand in CPUs? ，by Rick Merritt, SiliconValley Bureau Chief

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{pagination} IBM's Last Stand in CPUs? Rick Merritt, SiliconValley Bureau Chief The Open Power Consortium could become IBM's last stand in microprocessors with huge implications for the future of Big Blue. Years ago, IBM took a shot at the mainstream PC market when it forged its PowerPC alliance with Motorola. Intel won, and the partners retrenched into the embedded market with the Power.org consortium. These days, their embedded partners -- LSI, Freescale, and others -- are all shifting to ARM cores. After a last foray trying to gain traction in China, Power.org appears to be quietly withering away. Exacerbating IBM's woes, the company appears to have been designed out of at least two of the three next-generation game consoles where it once provided its Cell multicore processor, ASIC technology, and other goodies. Microsoft's Xbox One and Sony's Playstation 4 both use AMD's cores. The muscular, custom console processors once were significant drivers of process technology and profits for Big Blue. Now IBM is left to defend its main stronghold, the high-end server. This, too, is under siege. These days the massive scale-out datacenters of web giants such as Amazon, Facebook, Google, and Microsoft are increasingly driving server technology and volumes. The x86 rules here along with an emerging streamlined style of design that's in opposition to the muscular scale-up style IBM practices for its classic customers in banking, government, and scientific markets. Even in the Top 500 Supercomputers, IBM's old turf, it is losing ground to scale out designs using Nvidia GPUs paired with racks of x86 systems. Now Intel is coming on strong here with its own multicore Xeon Phi, which some say is offering higher performance, lower cost, and easier development than Nvidia GPUs. In the coldest cut of all, Amazon recently won a deal to supply computer services to the CIA, encroaching on the business of IBM's federal systems division, the bluest of Big Blue business units. Like everyone else, the government is under pressure to try out cloud computing services such as Amazon to reduce cost. The trend lines just don't look good for IBM. One bright spot is it managed to convince Google to join Open Power. Just what Google plans to build with Power chips is unclear. It's not game over by any means. IBM is expected to announce more Open Power partners before the end of the year. That said, this group needs to deliver significant new makers of Power servers to give the architecture a broad enough base of supporters to keep it viable long term. Nothing ever goes away in electronics. Big banks and government labs will be using IBM mainframes and servers for many years. But if the economics of Power turn further south, IBM's management will be left with some hard choices. They will have to make their decisions at a time when the return on investment in making semiconductors of any kind is increasingly grim as we approach the last few nodes of CMOS scaling. IBM makes its money on software and services, but those products are tied to its Power and proprietary mainframe hardware. If the chips and boxes become unsustainable, IBM could implode into a much smaller IT company that services a diminishing set of very high-end accounts. Big Blue has come back from the brink a couple times before. I can't predict the future, but I think it will take more than Open Power to shift its fortunes this time.