Edge data is critical to AI — here’s how Dell is helping enterprises unlock its value

It’s anticipated that by next year, more than 50% of enterprise data will be created and processed outside traditional data centers or clouds. In this age of AI, enterprises need to be able to quickly access and extract value from that edge data — but it can be time-consuming and complicated to do so, and many enterprise leaders are still operating with a cloud mindset. 

To help reduce complexity and make edge computing more accessible, Dell is today announcing new advancements to its Dell NativeEdge edge operations software platform. The offering aims to help simplify how enterprises deploy, scale and use AI across numerous types of edge environments. 

“The edge is a place where there are a lot of opportunities but a lot of silos and challenges,” Pierluca Chiodelli, Dell’s VP of edge product management, told VentureBeat. “We wanted to create a platform to democratize the edge.” 

Supporting inferencing, offering multi-node capabilities 

At the far edge, most deployments are on a single node, Chiodelli explained. But this can present challenges when it comes to reliability, scalability and computing power, not to mention cost. 

Dell NativeEdge, which is part of the company’s AI Factory, provides multi-node high-availability capabilities. This means that endpoints can be grouped together to act like a single system, allowing enterprises to maintain business processes and edge AI workloads even when there are network disruptions or device failures. It also supports virtual machine (VM) migration — the process of moving a machine from one physical location to another without disrupting availability or performance — as well as automatic app, compute and storage failover. 

AI inferencing is increasingly important at the edge, but it can be tedious and time-consuming to deploy AI across “hundreds, if not thousands,” of edge locations, Chiodelli pointed out. To address this, Dell is now offering a catalog of more than 55 pre-built blueprints that automate AI deployment. 

The new catalog includes several popular open-source tools as well as a data collector that transfers data from sensors and IoT devices and Geti-branded software that can accelerate the development of computer vision AI models at the edge. 

Chiodelli explained that Dell NativeEdge is consumption-based, and customers pay per each device under management (whether that be a small gateway or a large server).

Zero touch, zero trust, adapting with fast-moving AI

Chiodelli pointed out that it is important that users have the ability to adapt to changing workload demands across broad environments; they must also be able to adjust on the fly. 

“With AI, everything changes everyday,” said Chiodelli. Human users need to not just be able to intervene on day 0 (inception) but also on day 2 (management) to keep up. Zero touch is important to all this because “You don’t need to have IT people going to different locations and trying to deploy things,” said Chiodelli. 

Security is also paramount; Dell NativeEdge is built on a zero-trust model, and the platform continually monitors the security of edge infrastructure, Chiodelli exaplained. “You really need zero trust because you are in the land of nowhere, you cannot trust anybody,” he said. 

Dell NativeEdge has been deployed by customers across numerous industries. French-headquartered multinational IT company Atos, for instance, used the platform to create Atos business-outcomes-as-a-service (BOaaS). The edge management tool works with AI and machine learning (ML) and helps customers deploy, automate and optimize their edge environments through a single dashboard. 

As one example, BOaaS has allowed Atos’s manufacturing customers to see measurable business improvements as the result of predictive maintenance. This in turn has helped them reduce downtime, decrease costs and optimize production. 

Another customer is Ontario-based Nature Fresh Farms. While most wouldn’t necessarily consider farms to be all that IT-savvy, the family-owned company has been using edge computing to support yield optimization and to perform real-time environmental monitoring. 

Previously, “they had a lot of solutions that were very siloed,” Chiodelli explained. It was a challenge to look at the entire estate and manage updates.

“Dell NativeEdge helps us monitor real-time infrastructure elements, ensuring optimal conditions for our produce, and receive comprehensive insights into our produce packaging operations,” said Keith Bradley, VP for IT.

In other cases, Dell NativeEdge has been used to perform preventative maintenance of amusement parks and to inspect railways and train tracks, Chiodelli noted. Other companies using the platform include GE, EY, AIShield and Nozomi Networks. 

“AI is accelerating new edge workloads and opportunities at an unprecedented rate, and organizations across industries are asking for simpler and more reliable ways to use AI at the edge,” said Gil Shneorson, SVP for Dell’s solutions and platforms.