The interactive video streaming market between content viewers and providers is growing. As the paradigm shifts from the traditional 'one to millions' broadcast streaming model to a next-generation 'millions to millions' interactive model, new solutions for next-generation infrastructure have emerged.

AMD announced the new Alveo MA35D media accelerator on the 6th. MA35D, designed as the industry's first 5nm ASIC, is powered by a specially designed video processing unit and is said to provide specialized support for interactive media services such as live streaming that accelerate the growth of the video market.

AMD emphasized that the Alveo MA35D will provide scalability for the delivery of compute-intensive content and contribute to reducing infrastructure costs. As a media accelerator equipped with two 5nm ASIC-based Video Processing Units (VPUs), it supports AV compression standards. It delivers up to 32x 1080p60 streams per card and supports high channel density with ultra-low latency performance.

Compared to the previous generation Alveo U30 media accelerator, this has been upgraded with up to 4 times higher channel density, up to 4 times lower latency at 4K, and 1.8 times improved compression performance. In terms of cost, it is possible to achieve a cost per channel that is twice as low, because although the Alveo MA35D is about twice as expensive as the U30, its channel density has increased fourfold.

Xilinx introduced the Alveo U50 and U30 solutions, optimized for video streaming, in 2020, prior to its acquisition by AMD. The launch of a product tailored to market demands was made as global video traffic surged due to the COVID-19 pandemic, leading to a significant increase in the growth of the interactive media market.

AMD, which unveiled the Alveo MA35D through a media briefing prior to the new product announcement, suggested that this media accelerator could be an ultra-low latency solution for cloud gaming as well as video collaboration, video conferencing, e-learning, and telemedicine, as well as large-scale interactive media.

According to AMD, the global video streaming market is growing at an average annual rate of over 20%. With the market projected to reach $213 billion by 2028, up from $61 billion in 2021, AMD has launched the Alveo MA35D, a next-generation media accelerator with even more powerful and optimized performance.

Girish Malipedi, Head of Data Center at AMD Xilinx, stated at a recent media briefing on new products, “The online video market is seeing a growing share of live streaming,” and revealed that as of 2021, real-time video accounted for 70% of the global video market share, while on-demand video accounted for 30%.
Since the Alveo MA35D is ASIC-based, it does not support programmability compared to the FPGA-based U30, but it has a comparative advantage in all aspects of performance, including throughput, power, and cost, compared to software-based systems. In response to this during a media briefing, AMD stated that a performance improvement of more than 15 times is possible, adding, “When looking at the pure video market, it is so superior that it cannot even compete with expensive, power-hungry GPUs.”

To scale high-volume streaming services, it is necessary to maximize the number of channels per server while minimizing power and bandwidth per stream. The MA35D, a 1U rack server equipped with eight cards, provides up to 32x 1080p60 streams per card at 1 watt per stream and supports maximizing the number of streams per server, rack, and data center by providing up to 256 channels.

The accelerator is equipped with an integrated AI processor to improve quality at reduced bandwidth. The MA35D also features an AI-based intelligent video pipeline to provide improvements in performance and perceived quality. This includes Region of Interest (ROI) encoding for text and face resolution, artifact detection for accurate scenes with high levels of motion and complexity, and content-aware encoding with predictive insights for bitrate optimization.

Dan Gibbons, General Manager of AMD AECG Data Center Group, emphasized, “We have worked to understand not only customers’ technical needs but also their infrastructure challenges in profitablely implementing interactive streaming services,” adding, “By developing the Alveo MA35D based on an ASIC architecture designed to meet vendors’ customized requirements, we can deliver immersive experiences and reduce deployment and operating costs.”

Meanwhile, it has been reported that the Alveo MA35D media accelerator is currently in the sample supply phase and production shipments are expected to begin in the upcoming third quarter.