In a collaboration that is seemingly significant in the space, decentralized artificial intelligence (AI) computing platform Phoenix and its strategic affiliate AI firm APEX Technologies has entered into a partnership with JD.com, China’s biggest internet company by total annual revenue. Specifically, the cooperation includes synergies with the latter’s technology wing, JDT (JD Technology), thus marking a significant step in the decentralized AI and GPU-compute space.
Thanks to its strategic partner and co-development firm APEX Technologies — Phoenix has been at the forefront of the decentralized AI computing frontier, and has fostered many tech and strategic partnerships with organizations including the likes of Shanghai Data Exchange, Smart Auto, and Bytedance. For perspective’s sake, APEX is one of China’s leading enterprise-level, predictive AI firms backed by mainstream giants, including Anker Innovations and Tencent.
On the other hand, JD.COM — widely recognized as China’s answer to Amazon — has its operations overseeing domains ranging from e-commerce to cloud computing to logistics. The aforementioned collaboration will see Phoenix’s Computation Layer leveraging global compute resources of JD Cloud as well as AI capabilities such its proprietary large language model (LLM) ChatRhino.
The power of decentralized technology is being unleashed
The bulk of this collaboration will see Phoenix leveraging the infrastructure and ecosystem capabilities of JDT and JD Cloud’s global GPU-enabled computing nodes, integrating them with Phoenix’s SkyNet framework, strengthening its decentralized compute network coverage. The cooperation will also enable Phoenix Computation Layer to access and tap into JDT’s native proprietary AI offerings — including AIGC and LLM (Large Language Model).
Additionally, reports suggest that APEX Technologies, Phoenix, and JDT are also developing enterprise-level joint solutions. The offerings will span diverse use cases such as AI-enabled customer relationship management (CRM), Internet of Things (IoT), and predictive analytics.
Phoenix’s AI Computation Layer development plan outlines a two-phase approach. The first phase focuses on developing strategic partnerships with enterprises for ‘compute node resources’ and deployment of AI applications on SkyNet. The subsequent phase involves having “retail clients” join the ‘compute network’ for GPU-enabled devices.
This collaboration seems to perfectly align with Phoenix’s development plan, providing a robust platform for both phases. Lastly, the firm’s tech blueprint also includes collaborations with other organizations, such as the Hong Kong-based decentralized AI research firm FLC (Federated Learning Consortium) and Shanghai-based AI-driven proprietary trading firm Tensor Investment.
Looking ahead
From the perspective of the broader landscape, such a partnership represents a significant milestone for the burgeoning space of Web 3-driven decentralized AI and cloud computing. By combining the strengths of traditional infrastructure providers and new platforms such as Phoenix, this signifies first that cost effective AI-scaling is here to stay, and second, traditional cloud computing vendors are still an important part of the picture.
With the current trend of things, due to the AI boom GPU compute resources are soon to become a scarce asset – platforms tapping into abundant GPU resources paired with strong AI foundation will prove to be prominent projects in the space.