Lenovo Accelerates Telco Transformation with Next-Gen Edge AI Innovations at MWC 2024 

BARCELONA, Spain, Feb. 26, 2024 – At MWC 2024, Lenovo unveiled next-generation Integrated Edge AI Solutions for Telco that help enterprises go beyond the data center to harness vast bodies of data at the far edge for transformative AI applications at scale while reducing energy consumption.

The innovations are part of a comprehensive pocket-to-cloud portfolio of Lenovo hybrid AI solutions designed to simplify the path to intelligent transformation for all industries. The solutions are attracting new customer collaborations with industry leaders, like Telefonica, to unlock the power of AI anywhere data is created and deliver it to businesses at the far edge in real-time.

As the telecom industry continues its dramatic evolution to enable the rollout of 5G and an AI-powered future, innovations in IT networks, cloud infrastructure and edge computing are critical to connecting today’s digital economy. Edge computing allows businesses to analyze data in real-time, enabling faster actionable insights for more efficient operations and services.

Bringing AI to the Edge at Scale

To support the massive amount of computing moving to the edge, a powerful lineup of new Lenovo Integrated Edge AI Solutions for Telco is on display at MWC in Barcelona with Lenovo’s ecosystem of partners. Highlights Include:

• New multi-cloud edge computing architecture with Telefonica tackles mission critical applications for smart cities, making it simple to leverage data throughout city streets in a wide array of AI use cases, including using video analytics and computer vision to identify smoke and fire, support public safety and improve emergency response times. Leveraging its own Telco Cloud with the range of Lenovo ThinkEdge servers and Motorola’s push-to-talk technology, Telefonica is demonstrating via a proof of concept the capabilities of multi-cloud at the edge, AI and computer vision to alert public safety officials of danger. The new solution orchestrates the entire edge-to-cloud ecosystem, seamlessly weaving infrastructure, connectivity and applications together to reliably support public safety and enhance emergency response with real-time AI.
• Expanded joint innovation partnership for telecom and cloud services helps Orange Group bring high performance, availability and energy efficiency to telco clients worldwide. In support of continued telecom advancement, Orange and Lenovo are also extending the partnership for three more years and launched a shared Sylva project validation center, addressing telco and edge use cases. The program will cover areas critical for future-proofing telecommunication infrastructure, including supporting operational efficiency, new open radio access and automation. Together, the companies will help worldwide telecom providers support sustainability targets and improve services.
• Jointly validated end-to-end deployment and orchestration for Open RAN with the Lenovo ThinkEdge SE455 V3 demonstrates the proven delivery of a cloud-based, software-defined networking approach that accelerates modern telecommunications and will contribute to a reduction in Time-to-Market (TTM) for introducing new features in telco networks. As the industry invests in Open RAN to reduce costs and improve innovation, the Lenovo ThinkEdge SE455 V3 server demonstrates lower total cost of ownership at the edge, achieving new energy efficiency breakthroughs with double the orchestrated workloads per socket and more than a 50 percent reduction in overall ORAN power consumption based on third party testing.
• Infrastructure solutions support cloud services with speed and simplicity. Based on rigorous testing performed by Orange Business, Lenovo infrastructure solutions are reducing power consumption of cloud services deployments for Orange Business by up to 25 percent, helping to bring high performance, availability, and energy efficiency to Orange Business clients.
• Transformation to cloud-based voice telephony for Deutsche Telekom’s next generation NIMS project leverages Lenovo and a wide ecosystem of industry partners. Through cloudification and automation, new functionalities in the voice network can be introduced with the click of a button. The transformation supports over seventeen million customer connections.
• Intel’s Edge Platform with Lenovo ThinkEdge enables enterprises to develop, deploy, run and manage edge applications at scale with cloud-like simplicity. Leveraging the Lenovo ThinkEdge SE350 V2, SE360 V2 and SE450, the platform helps to remove key barriers to broad edge AI adoption across vertical markets and incorporates Intel’s learnings from over 90,000 edge deployments to help businesses build and scale vertical-specific AI workloads. Intel’s Edge Platform provides specific optimizations built in for easy training of AI models and fast inferencing to proliferate new AI workloads across any industry. Leveraging Lenovo’s Open Cloud Automation (LOC-A) software, developers can deploy worldwide AI applications at the edge in a matter of minutes with one-touch provisioning from a single device, such as a PC, smart phone or tablet. Together, these capabilities overcome remote computing complexities to accelerate time-to-scale-deployment of AI workloads for enterprises at the edge while improving total cost of ownership.
• The Telco Cloud and Orchestration Solution with Lenovo and Rakuten operates with the award-winning Rakuten Cloud Native Platform to help quickly orchestrate and deploy applications at the edge, reducing operating costs and complexity while accelerating time to delivery for a lower total cost of ownership. The solution delivers more power to securely automate large stateful edge workloads for telecom service providers, such as computer vision, voice AI and generative AI.

Customer Adoption

Combining AI-optimized infrastructure with its ecosystem of partners, Lenovo’s comprehensive range of far edge-to-cloud solutions go beyond the data center to enable key service providers to quickly deploy an entire network of high-power computing to drive revolutionary efficiency and intelligence for their own customers and beyond.

“Together with Lenovo, Telefonica is demonstrating how edge AI technologies can be used in a multi-cloud environment in everyday life, seamlessly bringing the power of the cloud to the scene of data and opening the door to new applications, like using computer vision at the edge for smoke and fire detection in order to reduce emergency response time,” said Felipe Jose Vicens Gonzalez, Hardware and Virtualization Infrastructure, Cloud and Infrastructure for Telefónica Global IT (GCTIO). “With Lenovo edge-to-cloud AI infrastructure, we are reimagining the possibilities and building the future of telecommunications.”

With purpose-built AI-ready infrastructure that goes beyond the data center to the edge, Lenovo is accelerating the new era of AI and helping businesses securely unlock the power of their data.

“Lenovo is focused on driving a new era of Hybrid AI and delivering an AI-powered future now by unlocking the power of data anywhere it is created,” said Charles Ferland, Vice President and General Manager, ThinkEdge and Communication Service Providers, Lenovo Infrastructure Solutions Group. “The ThinkEdge portfolio innovations are ushering a new era of edge automation that enables our ecosystem of partners and customers to simplify their path to AI and harness it for revolutionary applications.”

Availability and Support

Lenovo’s complete portfolio of edge servers, AI-ready storage and solutions are also supported by the new Lenovo AI Professional Services Practice, which helps customers fast track AI implementation from concept to results and enables data management for high performance workloads to be consumed via a pay-as-you-go model. Additionally, the Lenovo AI Innovators Program helps organizations gain access to enterprise AI by partnering with more than 50 of the industry’s leading software providers.

Also, today at MWC 2024, Lenovo launched new PC hardware and software solutions that showcase its focus on AI-driven innovation and commitment to a more sustainable future. These include brand new ThinkPad and ThinkBook business laptops and a stunning proof of concept. Find out more in the press release.

Visit  www.Lenovo.com/Telco to learn more about the Lenovo edge ecosystem, available solutions and customer adoption.

About Lenovo

Lenovo is a US$62 billion revenue global technology powerhouse, ranked #217 in the Fortune Global 500, employing 77,000 people around the world, and serving millions of customers every day in 180 markets. Focused on a bold vision to deliver Smarter Technology for All, Lenovo has built on its success as the world’s largest PC company by further expanding into growth areas that fuel the advancement of ‘New IT’ technologies (client, edge, cloud, network, and intelligence) including server, storage, mobile, software, solutions, and services. This transformation together with Lenovo’s world-changing innovation is building a more inclusive, trustworthy, and smarter future for everyone, everywhere. Lenovo is listed on the Hong Kong stock exchange under Lenovo Group Limited (HKSE: 992)(ADR: LNVGY).

Source: Lenovo