KDDI partnered with Broadcom to develop network infrastructure capable of supporting “social AI.”

The firms’ collaboration will focus on optical-electronic convergence, beginning with joint testing of co-packaged optics (CPO) technology for communications between GPUs in AI-centric data centers. The companies will establish a test environment at a KDDI data center, deploying a CPO switch incorporating Broadcom's latest-generation Tomahawk 6 Ethernet switching chip and Davisson optical engines.

The joint verification will assess the potential power savings of CPO switching alongside network performance under simulated distributed AI training and inference workloads. Testing will examine packet loss, congestion control, and effective throughput to determine whether the architecture can meet AI workload demands.

The partnership will also examine the migration of residential broadband networks to next-generation fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) infrastructure. The initiative aims to improve connectivity between data centers and end users, with KDDI identifying high bandwidth and low latency as essential requirements for bringing AI-powered services into homes.

This is an example of “social implementation,” the Japanese term-in-translation for when technology is moved beyond research into everyday business and consumer use.

The "social AI" collaboration also aligns with the Digital Belt initiative, a venture from the Japanese telecom giant in integrating AI computing resources and communications infrastructure across Japan. The strategy combines data centers and submarine cables with technologies including all-photonics networks (APNs) and 6G to establish a nationwide low-latency infrastructure spanning land, sea, and air.