Intel and Google co-design chip to reduce CPU in Cloud workloads with new C3 VM type and Hyperdisk

Intel and Google have co-designed a new custom-made infrastructure processing unit (IPU) chip known as E2000 to reduce the load on the primary CPU and take care of the data-intensive cloud workloads more securely and efficiently.

The E2000 IPUs will be used in Google’s new C3 Virtual machines (VMs), which are deployed in the public cloud.

Nick McKeown, Senior Vice President, Intel Fellow, and General Manager of Network and Edge Group said, "We are pleased to have co-designed the first ASIC Infrastructure Processing Unit with Google Cloud, which has now launched in the new C3 machine series. A first of its kind in any public cloud, C3 VMs will run workloads on 4th Gen Intel Xeon Scalable processors while they free up programmable packet processing to the IPUs securely at line rates of 200Gb/s. This Intel and Google collaboration enables customers through infrastructure that is more secure, flexible, and performant."

Aaron Sheldon, Sr. Software Engineer, Snap Inc., said, "We were pleased to observe a 20% increase in performance over the current generation C2 VMs from Google Cloud in testing with one of our key workloads. These continued performance improvements enable better end-user experience and application cost efficiency."

The virtual machines will use Intel’s 4th Gen Intel Xeon Scalable processor to run workloads, while the high-speed packet processing will be handled by the E2000 chips.

Packet processing is a process in which algorithms are used to help the network identify latency-critical data traffic and prioritize it above other packets. Latency is the time taken for data to travel from a source to the endpoint.

C3 VMs are now available in private preview to Google Cloud customers. Some of these customers, such as Snap Inc, the parent company of Snapchat, said that it had seen a 20% increase in performance in C3 VMs over the current generation C2 VMs.