Data Processing Unit

<p>A Data Processing Unit (DPU) — also called a SmartNIC or Infrastructure Processing Unit (IPU) — is a specialised processor integrated into a network adapter that handles data-plane functions: packet processing, encryption/decryption, storage protocol offload (NVMe-oF, iSCSI) and security (micro-segmentation, DDoS mitigation). By moving these functions off the host CPU, the DPU frees CPU cores for revenue-generating workloads.</p><p>In AI infrastructure, DPUs are increasingly important for scaling storage and networking without proportionally increasing CPU count. NVIDIA's BlueField DPU and Intel's Mount Evans IPU are the leading products. DPUs are also central to NVIDIA's Base Command and DGX SuperPOD architectures, where they handle in-band network management and storage fabric functions for GPU clusters.</p>