Nokia and Blaize target APAC with edge and hybrid AI inference solutions

The strategic partners have opened a new innovation lab in Singapore, and onboarded Indonesian cloud service provider Datacomm to develop use cases.

Nokia and Blaize — which delivers programmable, energy efficient AI computing — have launched a Nokia Network Innovation Lab in Singapore to bring edge and hybrid AI inference solutions to the Asia Pacific region.

With the lab, they aim to support the development, integration, and validation of hybrid AI infrastructure solutions combining Blaize’s AI platform with Nokia’s networking and infrastructure capabilities.

Additionally, Blaize recently signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Indonesian cloud service provider Datacomm Diangraha at GITEX AI Asia 2026 to jointly explore and develop AI inference use cases.

The collaboration will integrate Blaize’s hybrid AI platform with Datacomm’s cloud and data center infrastructure and support the development of scalable solutions across key sectors in Indonesia, including manufacturing, geospatial analytics, and enterprise.

The cloud service provider has partnered with Nokia for over 20 years, according to Benny Sumitro, managing director, Cloud & IT at Datacomm.

The new lab in Singapore and MoU are part of an expanded strategic collaboration between Nokia and Blaize, announced in January 2026.

“Nokia is very strong in terms of network connectivity,” Dion Leung, head of AI and Cloud, Asia Pacific at Nokia told CRN Asia.

“Today, we have solutions that connect data center to data center (DC-to-DC) in the optical sense, in the IP networking sense. But when it comes down to the edge and [AI] inference, this is where the unique partnership comes into play.

“One of the key things that I want to emphasize on top of the technology, is actually the partnership. In the open market, there are a lot of choices for compute [and] for networking.

“But what the partnership is all about is to make it easier for enterprise customers, cloud service providers, telecom service providers […] when they want to embark on the AI journey, they don't have to look, search, trial and error, and all that.

“We want to provide validated solutions so that they not only know that it will work — it has been proven. And that's why we are announcing that we are building the innovation lab together.”

The case for AI inference

As to why the partners decided to bring AI inference solutions to APAC, Datacomm’s Sumitro shared how he has seen over a 50% jump in requests from customers on the ground.

“Our customers are mainly from the public sector, government, telecom operators, and enterprise,” said Sumitro. “For the past six months, we have seen a 50% increase, probably more, on the requests for GPU or AI installation, either on-prem or on cloud.

“The 50% increase is not on the big flagship GPUs like S100, S300, or GP300, but it’s more on the inferencing side. So why this has happened is that right now the customer’s priority is how to capitalize on AI, not only use something like standard large language models (LLM), but how to integrate AI capability towards their day-to-day business operations, whether in the services, or in the financial or ERP system.

“They are struggling on how to integrate or capitalize on AI trend right now. The way that they able to do that is by inferencing, not by training. That’s why I believe that Blaize is very a good fit for us.”