You will see lots of custom stuff that Google does. There are many things that are better to outsource to 3rd parties, but many things are better in-house because the solutions just don't exist or they cost too much for the volume they need. Some examples:
You will see lots of custom stuff that Google does. There are many things that are better to outsource to 3rd parties, but many things are better in-house because the solutions just don't exist or they cost too much for the volume they need. Some examples:
Network routers for CLOS topology (there are pictures of some of the hardware): https://research.google.com/pubs/pub43837.html
Custom built SSDs (custom firmware/controller with a mix of flash chips from various vendors): https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/fast16/fast16...
Then you the TPU custom chip for running Tensorflow.