Huawei: ‘6 As’ to pave the way for ‘all intelligence’ era

Just as the company was working to establish itself as the technology leader in the deployment of services taking advantage of the 5G Advanced networks rolling out in key markets, Huawei has stated clearly the fundamental importance of artificial intelligence (AI) in making new infrastructures pay, creating what it said will be a reference architecture for intelligent transformation based on “six As” of intelligent enterprises.

In a speech at the Huawei Connect 2024 event in Shanghai, the comms tech giant’s deputy and rotating chairman, Eric Xu, stated that the age of “All Intelligence” had arrived, and would unlock new opportunities and challenges for everyone and every enterprise. He noted that overall, ongoing advancements in AI were driving more in-depth intelligent transformation across industries, laying the groundwork for All Intelligence.

Expanding on the theme, Xu highlighted the “six As” of intelligent enterprises in the age of AI: adaptive user experience; auto-evolving products; autonomous operations; augmented workforce; all-connected resources; and AI-native infrastructure.

He said the first four ‘A’s were the results of intelligent transformation, adding that every enterprise should consider using AI to transform and enhance operations more broadly and deeply.

“The first ‘A’ focuses on how future enterprises will serve their customers,” said Xu. “We believe it’s through an adaptive user experience. That is, intelligent enterprises will perceive and understand user behaviour, requirements, interests, tastes, and environmental changes, and then adapt to provide services that best meet user needs. The second ‘A’ stands for auto-evolving products.

“It relates to innate product functionality – the ability to auto-evolve,” he said. “In the age of AI, products will be able to self-learn, iterate continuously, adapt to changes, self-optimise and self-evolve. For example, self-driving vehicles will be able to learn by themselves – the more they drive, the better they drive. The shift from digital to intelligent products is a major advancement that will reshape the competitive landscape. Every enterprise needs to think about adding intelligent capabilities to its products.

“The third ‘A’ stands for Autonomous Operations. It means closed-loop autonomous operations for all business flows, from sensing and planning to decision-making and execution. Take smart ports, for example. Their intelligent planning platforms can automatically generate operation plans, while autonomous container trucks handle horizontal transportation. The fourth ‘A’ – Augmented Workforce – illustrates the future of employee experience and work methodology. It describes a workplace where every employee will have an intelligent assistant that understands their needs, helping them complete tasks more efficiently and with higher quality. For example, an assistant app can give field maintenance engineers quick access to mobile base station information such as fault location, root causes and suggestions for handling the fault.”

The remaining two ‘A’s referred to the building blocks of AI. All-Connected Resources was about connecting every part of an enterprise, from assets and employees to customers, partners and ecosystems with all business objects, processes and rules. There were two aspects to AI-Native Infrastructure, the last ‘A’: ICT for Intelligence and Intelligence for ICT. Xu stressed that ICT infrastructure needs to be built out systematically to keep up with the needs of intelligent applications to achieve ICT for Intelligence.

Adding to Xu’s vision, David Wang, Huawei’s executive director of the board and chairman of the ICT infrastructure managing board, noted that digital and intelligent transformation is picking up steam in all industries, and that such progress was creating huge opportunities. To realise these, he said it was incumbent on Huawei to work with customers and partners to build future-proof infrastructure as the fourth Industrial Revolution was currently being driven by digital and intelligent technologies, and to take productivity to new heights.

“We want to work with customers and partners to build future-proof infrastructure,” he said. “Together, we will also craft new scenario-specific solutions and create a fertile space for both the economy and society to thrive. Together, let’s seize the opportunities presented by this transformation and bring its benefits to all. Hand in hand, I know we will create a better future.”

During the event, Huawei also revealed a number of product launches, including 10 new digital and intelligent solutions for industries including public services, finance, transportation, manufacturing, electric power, mining, and oil and gas, based on the reference architecture for intelligent transformation. It also announced CANN 8.0, the latest version of the bedrock of the Ascend ecosystem, supporting over 200 new basic operators for in-depth optimisation, 80 fused operators and 100 application programming interfaces for communications and matrix multiplication.

It additionally published the Amplifying industrial digitalization and intelligence practice white paper, which contains 100 case studies from over 20 industries for customers to reference during their own digital and intelligent transformation.