NVIDIA Strategic Investments in Optical Interconnects
NVIDIA has committed over $4 billion in direct strategic investments across two optical interconnect companies, Lumentum and Coherent, supplemented by multibillion-dollar purchase agreements and equity participation in the optical startup Ayar Labs
SUSE Acquires Losant: Extending the Open Edge Stack into Industrial IoT
SUSE announced the acquisition of Losant, a Cincinnati-based industrial IoT (IIoT) platform. The acquisition marks a material expansion for SUSE, moving the company from being primarily an edge infrastructure provider (built around SUSE Linux Micro and K3s) to the application and orchestration layer, where operational data from industrial devices is aggregated, visualized, and acted on.
Research Note: Microsoft Azure Maia 200 Inference Accelerator
Microsoft recently announced its second-generation custom AI accelerator, the Maia 200. The new chip is an inference-optimized alternative to third-party GPUs in its Azure infrastructure. The company says the accelerator delivers 30% better performance per dollar than existing Azure hardware while supporting OpenAI’s GPT-5.2 models and Microsoft’s own synthetic data generation workloads.
Research Note: CrowdStrike’s Shopping Spree, Acquires SGNL and Seraphic
CrowdStrike announced two strategic acquisitions in January 2026 that extend its Falcon platform into browser runtime security and continuous identity authorization. The company acquired SGNL for $740 million and Seraphic Security for an undisclosed amount, with both transactions expected to close in Q1 FY2027.
“Chips” is now the “C” in CES
While the focus of CES 2026 remained on consumer electronics, this year felt different. More expansive, with the semiconductor industry dominating the pre-show with overlapping announcements that reveal diverging strategies for AI workload acceleration, manufacturing sovereignty, and market expansion beyond traditional computing segments.
The Ecosystem Takes Center Stage at AWS re:Invent 2025
AWS re:Invent 2025 has become an industry show, with this year’s event showcasing a partner ecosystem focused on agentic AI integration and unified observability. The conference featured major announcements from enterprise ISVs, security platforms, and enterprise software providers, all positioning their technologies to work seamlessly with AWS’s new AI capabilities.
Research Note: IBM to Acquire Confluent for Real-Time Event Streaming
IBM has entered a definitive agreement to acquire Confluent for $11 billion in cash ($31 per share), adding enterprise-grade Apache Kafka streaming infrastructure to its hybrid cloud and AI portfolio. Confluent brings 6,500 enterprise customers, proven streaming architecture handling real-time data flows across hybrid environments, and capabilities specifically relevant to emerging agentic AI requirements. The […]
Research Note: AWS S3 AI-Focused Enhancements
AWS announced several enhancements to its S3 storage platform at its recent re:Invent 2025, strengthening its object storage capabilities for adjacent markets, including vector databases, enterprise file systems, and enterprise data lakes.
The announcements include the general availability of S3 Vectors with substantially increased scale limits, new S3 integration with FSx for NetApp ONTAP file systems, cost-optimization features for S3 Tables, and expanded performance monitoring through S3 Storage Lens.
Research Note: AWS Releases Trainium3, Teases Trainium4
At its recent AWS re:Invent event, AWS moved its custom AI accelerator strategy into a new phase with the general availability of EC2 Trn3 UltraServers based on the Trainium3 chip and the public preview of its next-generation Trainium4.
Research Note: Snowflake BUILD 2025 Announcements
At its recent BUILD 2025 event, Snowflake unveiled a substantial array of platform updates centered on three core themes: compute performance optimization, data interoperability across heterogeneous environments, and operational automation.
The offerings address persistent enterprise challenges around data fragmentation, manual infrastructure management, and the operational overhead of supporting both transactional and analytical workloads on unified platforms.
Call Notes: Q4 Semiconductor Tracker
We’re in a moment that’s less about individual chip performance and more about processing-at-scale. It’s all about sprawling AI racks, optics, interconnect, and custom silicon hungry for scale, speed, and a story.
Research Brief: Oracle Database 26ai Delivers Fully Integrated AI
Oracle released its Oracle Database 26ai at its recent AI World event in Las Vegas. The update makes the database an integrated platform that embeds artificial intelligence capabilities across data management, development, and analytics operations.
The platform integrates vector search capabilities with traditional database functions, supports agentic AI workflows through in-database tools and MCP servers, and extends analytics capabilities through Iceberg table format support. Oracle also bundles in advanced AI features, including AI Vector Search, at no additional cost.
Oracle AI World 2025: Bringing Cohesion to the AI Data Stack
Oracle AI World 2025 in Las Vegas was a clear demonstration of how far the company has come from its roots as a database vendor. This year’s event, as its new name might give away, was all about AI.
Oracle’s announcements centered on its Oracle AI Data Platform, a new Oracle database release, the new Autonomous AI Lakehouse, along with new advances in Oracle’s distributed cloud portfolio, and deepened multi-cloud partnerships with both Google Cloud and AWS. That’s a lot – and we’re just hitting the highlights.
Research Note: MongoDB Application Modernization Platform (AMP)
At its recent MongoDB.local NYC event, MongoDB launched its Application Modernization Platform (AMP), seeing the database vendor’s expansion into full-stack enterprise application transformation services.
The new platform combines AI-powered code transformation tools, proven migration frameworks, and professional services to modernize legacy applications for MongoDB’s Atlas cloud platform.
Research Note: Cisco’s AI-Powered Transformation of the Splunk Portfolio at .conf 2025
At its recent Splunk .conf25 in Boston, Cisco unveiled a comprehensive suite of AI-powered enhancements across its recently acquired Splunk portfolio, showing significant progress in integrating the two companies’ technologies.
The announcements centered on three core themes: agentic AI automation, unified data architectures, and enhanced observability capabilities.
Research Note: Cloudera Acquires Taikun for Kubernetes Capabilities
Cloudera announced its acquisition of Taikun, a Czech-based company that develops a Kubernetes-native platform for managing cloud and on-premises infrastructure across hybrid and multi-cloud environments.
The acquisition adds a fully integrated, Kubernetes-based compute layer to the Cloudera Data Platform (CDP), enabling consistent deployment and management of data and AI services across distributed and regulated IT estates.
Research Note: AWS Open Sources MCP Server for Aparch Spark History Server
AWS recently announced the open-source release of Spark History Server MCP, a specialized implementation of the Model Context Protocol (MCP). This server enables AI agents to directly access and analyze historical execution data from Apache Spark workloads through a standardized, structured interface.
Research Note: AWS Enhances S3 for Enterprise AI
At its recent AWS Summit in NYC, Amazon Web Services introduced two significant enhancements to its S3 object storage service: S3 Vectors for cost-effective vector data storage and expanded S3 Metadata capabilities for comprehensive object visibility.
Research Note: Enterprise AI Agents Take Center Stage at AWS Summit NYC 2025
AWS recently concluded its New York City Summit with a clear message: the future of enterprise software is agentic AI, and Amazon aims to own the infrastructure that enables it.
Research Brief: Oracle Database@AWS
First announced in December 2024, Oracle and AWS have announced the general availability of Oracle Database@AWS. This strategic partnership positions Oracle Exadata Database Service and Oracle Autonomous Database on dedicated Oracle Cloud Infrastructure within AWS data centers.
NAND Insider Newsletter: Week of May 12, 2025
Each week NAND Research puts out a newsletter for our industry customers taking a look at what’s driving the week, and what happened last week that caught our attention. Below is a excerpt from this week’s, May 10, 2025.
Research Note: Dynatrace & AWS New Strategic Collaboration
Dynatrace and AWS announced a multi-year strategic collaboration agreement, deepening their decade-long partnership that began in 2014. This expanded collaboration aims to address enterprise challenges in digital transformation through enhanced AI-powered observability and security solutions.
Research Note: Rubrik Expands Annapurna to GCP
At Google Cloud Next 2025, Rubrik announced the expansion of Rubrik Annapurna, its API-driven AI data security and governance platform, to Google Cloud. The announcement sees Rubrik delivering Annapurna as a secure data access layer for AI-driven application development within Google’s Agentspace framework.
Research Note: Anthropic/Databricks Partnership
Anthropic recently announced a new five-year strategic partnership with Databricks to integrate its Claude language models, including the newly released Claude 3.7 Sonnet, into the Databricks Data Intelligence Platform.
The deal, valued at approximately $100 million, will allow Databricks’ enterprise customers to build, deploy, and govern AI agents that operate directly on their proprietary enterprise data. Databricks will offer Claude models natively through its platform across AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud.
Research Note: Enhanced Google Cloud NetApp Volumes
At the 2025 Google Cloud Next event, NetApp and Google Cloud announced a significant expansion of capabilities for Google Cloud NetApp Volumes, their jointly developed fully managed file storage offering.
The updates provide enhance performance, scalability, and integration with AI and compliance frameworks, targeting large-scale enterprise workloads
Research Note: OpenText Titanium X in CE 25.2
OpenText recently launched Titanium X, part of its Cloud Editions (CE) 25.2 release, its most comprehensive AI-native upgrade across all major product clouds. The release introduces new AI agents, expanded automation capabilities, and integrated cloud security enhancements.
MWC 2025 Playbook: Enterprise IT’s Big AI & 5G Moment
If you blinked, you might have missed the tidal wave of AI, 5G, and cloud announcements at Mobile World Congress 2025. But don’t worry—we’ve got the cheat sheet.
Research Note: Couchbase Edge Server for Offline-First Data Processing
Couchbase recently announced its new Couchbase Edge Server, a lightweight, offline-first database and sync solution designed for edge computing environments. The new solution extends Couchbase’s mobile data synchronization capabilities to resource-constrained deployments where full-scale database solutions are not feasible.
CoreWeave’s Wild Ride Towards IPO
CoreWeave, the AI-focused cloud provider that’s that was early in catching and riding the generative AI boom, is officially gunning for the big leagues. The NVIDIA-backed company has filed for an IPO, looking to capitalize on the insatiable demand for AI compute.
That’s big news for the AI infrastructure world, where CoreWeave has rapidly positioned itself as a major player, taking on the likes of Amazon, Google, and Microsoft.
But before you start picturing ringing bells on Wall Street and champagne toasts, there’s more to the story. A lot more.
Research Note: WEKA & HPE Set SpecStorage Records
WEKA and HPE recently announced record-breaking results across all five benchmark workloads in the SPECstorage Solution 2020 suite. The results were achieved using the WEKA Data Platform on the HPE Alletra Storage Server 4110, powered by Intel Xeon processors.
The results show the system’s ability to handle data-intensive workloads, including AI, genomics, software development, and video analytics, with high efficiency and low latency.
Quick Take: CQ4’24 Cloud Earnings
The top three US public cloud providers — Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud — each reported strong but slightly decelerating growth for calendar Q4 2024. The increasing importance of AI workloads, rising capital expenditures, and shifts in customer spending patterns all impacted earnings and guidance for the quarter.
Research Note: UALink Consortium Expands Board, adds Apple, Alibaba Cloud & Synopsys
The Ultra Accelerator Link Consortium (UALink), an industry organization taking a collaborative approach to advance high-speed interconnect standards for next-generation AI workloads, announced an expansion to its Board of Directors, welcoming Alibaba Cloud, Apple, and Synopsys – joining existing member companies like AMD, AWS, Cisco, Google, HPE, Intel, Meta, and Microsoft.
NAND Insider Newsletter: January 12, 2025
Every week NAND Research puts out a newsletter for our industry customers. Below is a excerpt from this week’s.
Research Brief: Oracle Exadata X11M
Oracle recently launched of its latest Exadata platform, the Oracle Exadata X11M. Purpose-built to optimize the performance of Oracle Database, including Oracle Autonomous Database, X11M is a significant leap forward in speed and efficiency compared to previous generation Exadata systems for cloud, multi-cloud, and customer data centers.
Research Note: Marvell Custom HBM for Cloud AI
Marvell recently announced a new custom high-bandwidth memory (HBM) compute architecture that addresses the scaling challenges of XPUs in AI workloads. The new architecture enables higher compute and memory density, reduced power consumption, and lower TCO for custom XPUs.
Research Note: AWS Trainium2
Tranium is AWS’s machine learning accelerator, and this week at its re:Invent event in Las Vegas, it announced the second generation, the cleverly named Trainium2, purpose-built to enhance the training of large-scale AI models, including foundation models and large language models.
Quick Take: AWS re:Invent AI Services & Infrastructure Announcement Wrap-Up
AWS has made close to 50 announcements in the first 2 days of re:Invent. This blog takes a look at the most interesting AI services & infrastructure related ones.
Quick Take: AWS re:Invent Day 1
AWS unveiled a range of new features and services, reflecting its continued focus on innovation across generative AI, compute, and storage. These announcements include enhancements to Amazon Bedrock for improved testing and data integration, new capabilities for the generative AI assistant Amazon Q, high-performance storage-optimized EC2 instances, and advanced storage solutions like intelligent tiering and a dedicated data transfer terminal
NAND Insider Newsletter: Week Ending Nov 17 2024
Every week we send a newsletter to our list of tech industry insiders. Here’s an excerpt of what we shared for the week ending November 17.
Quick Take: NTT DATA and Google Cloud Expand Strategic Partnership in APAC
NTT DATA recently announced an expanded partnership with Google Cloud to advance the adoption of cloud-based data analytics and generative AI solutions for enterprises in the Asia Pacific region.
The expanded relationship combines NTT DATA’s industry-specific expertise with Google Cloud’s AI and analytics infrastructure to drive sector-specific innovation and efficiency improvements across healthcare, financial services, retail, manufacturing, and public sector verticals.
What Earnings Tell Us About the Public Cloud Market
All of the major public cloud providers have released earnings for calendar Q3 2024, allowing us to draw conclusions about the state of the public cloud market and the relative competitiveness of each CSP. The public cloud market remains highly competitive and rapidly evolving, with each provider strategically leveraging AI, infrastructure innovation, and multi-cloud partnerships to drive growth.
Is Ampere Computing Up for Sale?
Ampere Computing, the leading vendor of server processors based on the Arm architecture, is reportedly exploring a sale, signaling a strategic pivot amidst increasing competition in the market for alternative server processors.
Research Note: NetApp & AWS Expand Strategic Collaboration Agreement
NetApp recently announced the expansion of its long-standing partnership with Amazon Web Services. The new Strategic Collaboration Agreement (SCA) strengthens the relationship between the two companies, paving the way for enhanced generative AI capabilities and streamlined CloudOps for joint customers.
Research Note: NetApp Updates Cloud Offerings
NetApp announced new capabilities designed for strategic cloud workloads, including GenAI and VMware, to help reduce the resources and risks for managing these workloads in hybrid multi-cloud environments.
Research Note: AWS Updates Bedrock
Amazon Web Services (AWS) announced a series of significant enhancements to its Bedrock platform aimed at bolstering the capabilities and reliability of generative AI applications. These enhancements focus on improved data connectivity, advanced safety features, and robust governance mechanisms.
Quick Take: AWS Launches Graviton 4
Today, Amazon Web Services (AWS) launched its Graviton4 processors, the fourth generation of its Arm-based custom processors. This new chip is touted as AWS’s most energy-efficient and high-performance solution for cloud workloads, marking a significant upgrade over its predecessor, Graviton3.
Quick Take: IBM & AWS Collaborate on Responsible AI
At the IBM Think conference, IBM announced a collaboration with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to integrate the full suite of IBM’s watsonx AI and data platform with AWS services. The partnership helps streamline enterprise AI scaling through an open, hybrid approach with comprehensive governance.
Microsoft Azure Cobalt 100 Arm-based VMs
At its 2024 Microsoft Build Event this week, Microsoft announced the preview of new Azure Virtual Machines powered by Microsoft’s previously announced in-house-design Arm-based processor, the Cobalt 100
Quick Take: AWS Leadership Transition
Amazon Web Services (AWS) is undertaking a significant leadership change as longtime CEO Adam Selipsky steps down to “prioritize family time” after a 14-year tenure with the company. Matt Garman, Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing at AWS, is slated to succeed Selipsky effective June 3.
Sovereign Cloud Explained
As enterprises increasingly migrate to the cloud, ensuring that data remains secure, private, and within legal jurisdictional boundaries is paramount. Sovereign cloud solutions have emerged as a pivotal technological innovation designed to address these complex requirements.
AWS And Nvidia Expand AI Relationship
At the Nvidia GTC event in San Jose, Nvidia and Amazon Web Services made a series of wide-ranging announcements that showed a broad and strategic collaboration to accelerate AI innovation and infrastructure capabilities globally.
The joint announcements included the introduction of Nvidia Grace Blackwell GPU-based Amazon EC2 instances, Nvidia DGX Cloud integration, and, most critically, a pivotal collaboration called Project Ceiba.
Research Note: AWS Bedrock GenAI Enhancements
Amazon announced updates to its Bedrock generative AI platform that expands its capabilities while improving the user experience. These enhancements focus on helping developers create AI applications quickly and securely.
Research Note: NVIDIA & AWS’s Broad AI-Focused Collaboration
At the Nvidia GTC event in San Jose, Nvidia and Amazon Web Services made a series of wide-ranging announcements that showed a broad and strategic collaboration to accelerate global AI innovation and infrastructure capabilities.
The joint announcements included the introduction of NVIDIA Grace Blackwell GPU-based Amazon EC2 instances, NVIDIA DGX Cloud integration, and, most critically, a pivotal collaboration called Project Ceiba.
Research Note: Amazon’s New Graviton4 & Tranium2
Amazon introduced generational updates to both its Graviton and Tranium custom silicon solutions at its recent re:Invent conference in Las Vegas.
This Research Note delves into the intricacies and potential impacts of these latest innovations from AWS.
Research Note: Inside Q3 2023 Cloud Earnings
This research note delves into the earnings reported by the top three public cloud providers (Amazon, Microsoft, and Google) over the past week.
What Q3 Earnings Tell Us about Public Cloud
The recent earnings reports from the top three public cloud providers, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft, and Google Cloud, shows that the overall public cloud market remains robust and is starting to show signs of increased growth after several quarters of shrinking growth.
Quick Take: Amazon Invests $4B in AI Model Developer Anthropic
Amazon has invested $4 billion in model developer Anthropic, with Amazon Web Services (AWS) becoming its primary cloud provider.
Amazon Unveils New Cloud Storage Offerings at AWS Storage Day
At Amazon’s recent AWS Storage Day, Amazon announced updated to FSx for Lustre, Logical air-gap for AWS Backup, and expanded DataSync integrations.
Qualcomm’s New Auto Platform, Partnership with AWS & Expanded Reach into Auto OEMs
Qualcomm made a number of announcements at this week’s IAA Mobility Event in Munich. Let’s look at what the company said. News: AWS Cloud Innovation Partnership Qualcomm and Amazon Web Services (AWS) announced a strategic partnership to advance innovation in the automotive industry. Recognizing the growing significance of software-defined features, the explosion of data analytics, […]
The 2023 Enterprise Storage Agenda
2023 is going to be an exciting year in enterprise storage. Principal Analyst Steve McDowell walks us through his predictions for the storage industry over the coming calendar year.