Analyst(s): Ron Westfall
Publication Date: Mar 3, 2025
What is Covered in this Article:
- The partnership plans to integrate IBM watsonx.governance, designed to help businesses manage their AI responsibly at enterprise scale, into the Qualcomm AI Inference Suite and run on devices powered by Qualcomm’s platforms.
- IBM’s Granite 3.1 models have been optimized and are available for download through the Qualcomm AI Hub aimed at empowering developers and businesses to cultivate the potential of AI at the edge with Qualcomm’s platforms.
- Qualcomm Cloud AI family of accelerators has received Red Hat OpenShift certification, enabling hybrid cloud deployments.
The News: Qualcomm and IBM announced an expanded collaboration to drive enterprise-grade generative artificial intelligence (AI) solutions across edge and cloud devices designed to enable increased immediacy, privacy, reliability, personalization, and reduced cost and energy consumption. Through this collaboration, the companies plan to integrate watsonx.governance for generative AI solutions powered by Qualcomm Technologies’ platforms and enable support for IBM’s Granite models through the Qualcomm AI Inference Suite and Qualcomm AI Hub.
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Analyst Take: Expanding upon an announcement at CES, Qualcomm Technologies and IBM plan to run watsonx.govenance, Granite Guardian 8B, and Granite 3.1 8B models on a Snapdragon 8 Elite reference design and the Qualcomm Dragonwing AI On-Prem Appliance Solution with the Qualcomm AI Inference Suite.
These models are built to work in tandem to provide end-to-end generative AI solutions running at the edge that contain guardrails for controlling model deployments and operations, monitoring, and enhanced decision-making. Through this collaboration, Qualcomm Technologies and IBM are spotlighting combining on-device inferencing, low power, and privacy features with the performance of watsonx to help address security, efficiency, reliability, and governance from AI solutions for businesses.
Qualcomm Technologies has prioritized optimizing IBM’s Granite 3.1, IBM’s third-generation Granite flagship language models, for the Qualcomm AI Hub to help empower developers and businesses to cultivate the full potential of AI at the edge. The companies will expand the Qualcomm AI Hub and IBM watsonx collaboration to include governance and responsibility guardrails for on-device models via watsonx.governance capabilities.
Moreover, the Qualcomm Cloud AI family of accelerators is now certified and available for Red Hat OpenShift, a hybrid cloud application platform powered by Kubernetes. The certification expedites the deployment at scale of IBM’s suite of software applications, including watsonx, using hardware solutions based on Qualcomm Cloud AI.
Partnership Makes Scalability and Security Integral
By combining edge and cloud computing, the partnership optimizes AI deployment for both low-latency real-time applications and high-level tasks requiring large model processing. From my view, this approach enhances scalability and privacy preservation, making it purpose-developed and well-suited for data-intensive tasks.
The collaboration also aims to reduce costs and energy consumption by leveraging on-device inferencing and low power features, which are essential for sustainable AI deployment. By minimizing reliance on cloud infrastructure, on-device AI helps reduce the carbon footprint of AI operations, contributing to more sustainable outcomes. On-device AI can reduce costs related to data transfer, server maintenance, and cloud service subscriptions, making it more cost-effective for businesses to prioritize in their overall AI implementation strategies.
Processing data locally improves privacy and security by minimizing the exposure of sensitive information during data transmission. This aligns with in-device AI that enables devices to perform effectively even in areas with unstable or no internet connectivity, expanding AI accessibility and reinforcing privacy assurances.
The AI Ecosystem Benefits of the OpenShift Connection
I expect the Qualcomm IBM alliance to gain a mind share and sales and marketing boost from the Red Hat OpenShift collaboration. OpenShift provides a flexible and scalable platform that supports both cloud and edge environments, enabling enterprises to flexibly deploy AI applications across various infrastructure types, including public clouds, data centers, and edge environments.
OpenShift offers an open ecosystem that integrates with a variety of hardware and software accelerators, enabling businesses to choose the best tools for their specific AI use cases, reinforcing the ability of the partnership to meet unique vertical needs. OpenShift certification helps ensure that software and hardware components work together across OpenShift, providing a stable and supported environment for enterprise applications.
This is crucial for hybrid cloud deployments, where managing diverse workloads efficiently is key, fully aligning with Qualcomm’s Cloud AI accelerators built to improve AI inference performance in cloud environments and as such accelerate enterprise adoption of hybrid AI.
Qualcomm Dragonwing Ready to Take Off
This partnership can directly fulfill industry-specific requirements across verticals by enabling rapid, data-driven decisions. It empowers businesses to capitalize on AI’s transformative power regardless of where the data resides. By analyzing user behavior locally, on-device AI can provide domain-specific experiences, enhancing workforce satisfaction and engagement.
I find that delivering such capabilities further underscores why Qualcomm’s Dragonwing suite of industrial and embedded IoT, networking, and cellular infrastructure solutions is integral to advancing hybrid AI. This portfolio is designed to address the needs of industries such as energy, utilities, retail, supply chain, manufacturing, and telecom, providing them with AI-infused IoT capabilities.
The Dragonwing portfolio includes the IQ and Q chipset series, providing features such as integrated safety, high-performance CPUs, GPUs, and AI accelerators. These technologies support industrial-grade applications throughout harsh environments, making them suitable for industrial applications such as robotics, drones, AGVs, etc.
Looking Ahead
Overall, I believe the Qualcomm IBM alliance can spur broader adoption of on-device inferencing and low-power features, which are crucial for sustainable AI deployment by helping fulfill energy efficiency goals alongside improving performance and augmenting workforce/user experiences. The new Qualcomm IBM alliance is an AI ecosystem breakthrough because it addresses key challenges in enterprise AI deployment, such as governance, scalability, efficiency, and industry transformation, ready to deliver significant advancement in the building and delivery of enterprise-grade generative AI solutions.
See the complete Qualcomm press release on the Qualcomm site.
Disclosure: The Futurum Group is a research and advisory firm that engages or has engaged in research, analysis, and advisory services with many technology companies, including those mentioned in this article. The author does not hold any equity positions with any company mentioned in this article.
Analysis and opinions expressed herein are specific to the analyst individually and data and other information that might have been provided for validation, not those of The Futurum Group as a whole.
Other insights from The Futurum Group:
IBM Power: Driving Innovation for Core Workloads with AI and Hybrid Cloud
Qualcomm Ready to Usher in the Age of Industrial Intelligence
Qualcomm, Ericsson, AT&T Moves Shine Spotlight on IoT – Six Five Webcast: The 5G Factor
Author Information
Ron is an experienced, customer-focused research expert and analyst, with over 20 years of experience in the digital and IT transformation markets, working with businesses to drive consistent revenue and sales growth.
Ron holds a Master of Arts in Public Policy from University of Nevada — Las Vegas and a Bachelor of Arts in political science/government from William and Mary.
