Zoho has launched Nathu La, a server designed in-house, marking a step in its effort to build its own technology stack.
Developed with Intel and using Intel Xeon 6 processors, the server delivers equivalent performance with 12-18% lower power consumption and 20-30% lower total cost of ownership, according to Zoho. The company said this lowers inference costs for artificial intelligence workloads.
Nathu La is part of Zoho's broader push to control more of the infrastructure behind its products, from hardware to software applications. Zoho plans to host its applications on the platform so it can tune hardware and software together for its workloads while tightening data governance for customers.
The design follows the Open Compute Project approach, focusing on modularity, thermal efficiency and easier maintenance. Zoho said these features are intended to reduce data centre operating costs and electricity use.
Five-year effort
According to Zoho, the motherboard and chassis platform are the result of five years of research and development across hardware, firmware and systems management. The server is designed for virtualisation, high-performance computing, AI inference and storage applications.
It also includes customised power delivery subsystems, an in-house DC-SCM design and modular chassis options intended for different deployment environments. Zoho said modular components, including the DC-SCM and network interface card, were designed by its hardware engineering team and assembled by electronic manufacturing services partners in India.
Zoho said it has filed more than five patents covering thermal management and server architecture designs linked to the platform.
Sovereignty push
Zoho framed the launch as part of a wider move towards technological sovereignty, arguing that indigenous intellectual property reduces reliance on outside parties for security audits, firmware updates and licensing continuity. It added that the platform is built with hardware-rooted security across the stack.
The company also tied the server to domestic sourcing and open-source software policy requirements in India, saying the product supports national programmes focused on local manufacturing, self-reliance and supercomputing infrastructure.
Chandrashekar LSP, Managing Director of Zoho Canada, linked the launch to Zoho's long-running strategy of building more of its own technology. "Zoho Corporation has invested in building its own technology stack from the ground up over the last three decades. The Nathu La server launch is in line with that goal," he said.
He added that Zoho sees cumulative benefits in controlling more layers of the system used to run its software and AI models. "With Zoho's strategy of using contextual, right-sized models, running on our own platform, now on our own servers, accelerated by our own GPU database, we are compounding the benefits accrued from owning and operating our entire technology stack. These long-term R&D investments we are making at every layer of the stack are aimed at delivering customer value and ensuring that our solutions are more sustainable and accessible for businesses than the competition," LSP said.
Zoho is the parent company of Zoho and ManageEngine and says it offers more than 55 applications across major business software categories, with more than 90 offices worldwide.