Intel buys Qlogic's Infiniband business for $125m

CHIPMAKER Intel has bought Qlogic's Infiniband business for $125m.

While Intel's decade long push into the datacenter has been a success the firm needs to bolster its connectivity technology if it aims to feed its ever faster processors with enough data. Yesterday Intel announced that it had signed an agreement to buy Qlogic's Infiniband business for $125m.

Intel said its acquisition of Qlogic's Infiniband business would "enhance Intel's networking portfolio and provide scalable high-performance computing fabric technology". The firm didn't waste any time in citing the acquisition as part of its work to produce an exaflops supercomputer by 2018.

Intel's outgoing VP and GM of its Data Center and Connected System Group, Kirk Skaugen said, "The technology and expertise from QLogic provide important assets to provide the scalable system fabric needed to execute on this vision [produce an exascale supercomputer]. Adding QLogic's InfiniBand product line to our networking portfolio will bring increased options and exceptional value to our datacenter customers."

Like all technology firms with enterprise aspirations Intel has been pushing its cloud agenda, however the question of fast network connectivity remains unanswered. Infiniband is often used as the switching fabric in supercomputers due to its performance characteristics, and if Chipzilla can lower costs and incorporate Infiniband into its high-end nearline server kit, it could be onto a winner. µ