Türkiye gives hope to tech investors worldwide

By Goksel Yildirim and Bahattin Gonultas

BERLIN (AA) – Türkiye gives hope to tech investors worldwide, as the Chinese tech conglomerate Huawei deems the country promising for further investments at the firm’s annual Data Infrastructure Forum held in Berlin.

Peter Zhou, the head of Huawei’s data storage product line, told Anadolu that the world’s leading communication technologies provider Huawei continues its operations in five representative offices in Türkiye.

Zhou said the firm has a research and development center in Türkiye where projects and work on software, as well as customer service operations, are conducted mostly by Turkish engineers.

He noted that Huawei employees in Türkiye also contribute to the firm’s local partners and companies with services, and that Türkiye receives investment for its collaboration opportunities and research institutes.

- AI to transform storing data

Zhou mentioned that Huawei has developed a new artificial intelligence (AI)-powered storage product, the OceanStor A800, along with a new high-capacity solid state drive (SSD) and an update to the firm’s data management engine that now features AI-powered capabilities.

Hoping for companies to switch to this new system and move away from the tape system, which he described as “terrible,” Zhou said tape storage is inefficient and has issues as it needs to be stored in temperature and humidity-controlled areas.

Tape storage, first used in 1951, is generally recognized as a cost-effective solution to store data, however, it suffers from long access times and slow transfer speeds.

The rapid spread of AI in the last few years disrupted traditional storage solutions, causing performance issues along with many more, said Zhou, and noted that these challenges can be overcome by redefining data storage by innovating sustainability and data structure.

- Most energy-efficient storage solution

Zhou highlighted that the A800 is Huawei’s most energy-efficient storage solution to date, offering 1 petabyte (1,024 terabytes) in storage per U (rack unit) and 0.7 watts of energy efficiency per terabyte.

He also said the A800 is mainly for high-performance NAS (network-attached storage), which is widely used for productive AI.

With its robust and state-of-the-art architecture, Zhou stressed that the A800 will end waste and loss of energy and efficiency in storing data.

He mentioned that the A800 delivers four times more speed in gigabits per second and eight times more input/output operations compared to a storage solution by an unnamed firm equal in caliber to the A800, by utilizing its AI clusters at only 30%.

Also, the firm announced a new high-capacity SSD solution providing 128 terabytes per disk, which is estimated to take up 88% less storage space and consume 92% less energy per petabyte compared to a competing SSD solution from an unnamed vendor.

*Writing by Emir Yildirim in Istanbul