Microsoft launches Azure Boost DPU to enhance infrastructure efficiency

Microsoft has unveiled a new in-house Data Processing Unit (DPU) named Azure Boost DPU. This DPU is designed to bolster the efficiency of Microsoft’s Azure cloud-based services by upgrading the hardware that underpins them.

The company has been working on DPUs—silicon chips that can handle specific types of data-centric workloads usually handled by general-purpose processors—for some time now.

In a blog post, Microsoft explained that traditional central processing units (CPUs) are great for general-purpose tasks but struggle to handle multiple data streams, such as those required by network connections.

Graphical processing units (GPUs), on the other hand, are excellent at performing many calculations on large sets of data in parallel. Still, they’re not so hot when dealing with the kind of data movement and storage management required by modern cloud and AI workloads.

To address these challenges, Microsoft has developed Azure Boost DPU, a custom DPU designed to run Azure’s data-centric workloads with high efficiency and low power.

Built specifically for Microsoft’s cloud infrastructure, Azure Boost DPU is a hardware-software co-design that runs a custom, lightweight data-flow operating system. Compared to traditional implementations, it enables platforms with higher performance, lower power consumption, and enhanced efficiency.

Microsoft expects DPUs to run cloud storage workloads at three times less power and four times the performance of existing CPUs. Furthermore, DPU-based systems add a custom application layer that leverages the DPU’s tightly integrated data compression, data protection, and cryptography engines, setting a new standard for security and reliability.

Azure Boost DPU is part of Microsoft’s broader effort to optimize its cloud infrastructure by developing its hardware.

In June, the company revealed that it had developed a custom AI chip for its data centers, dubbed Microsoft Azure 2AI.

In addition, Azure Boost DPU joins Microsoft’s previously announced Azure 2AI Accelerated Infrastructure, which features the 2AI chip along with other components such as purpose-built storage and networking hardware designed to work together to run modern cloud workloads more efficiently.

In any case, Microsoft says Azure Boost DPU will be available to customers and partners.

In other news, this year’s Ignite conference has brought numerous new capabilities to the Azure platform, including Azure Local, Azure AI Foundry, and Azure AI Content Understanding.