Cisco is the dominant vendor in enterprise networking, and under CEO Chuck Robbins, the company is implementing significant changes.

Among its substantial strategic decisions is the $28 billion acquisition of Splunk, marking a decisive expansion into observability, data analytics, AIOps, and genAI sectors. In the sphere of security, Cisco is enhancing its enterprise security solutions with the development of its new Hypershield AI-native architecture, among other updates. Concurrently, Cisco manages the ongoing challenges of the tech sector including supply issues, workforce reductions, and organizational restructuring.

For more updates, here is the latest news and insights on Cisco.

Aug. 30, 2024: Cisco now integrates its AppDynamics application management suite with Microsoft Azure cloud services. This integration allows for enhanced management of app performance and resources on Microsoft’s cloud environment.

Aug. 27, 2024: Cisco announced plans to acquire Robust Intelligence, a security startup with a platform designed to protect AI models and data throughout the development-to-production lifecycle. It’s paying an undisclosed amount to acquire the company, which Cisco has previously invested in through its Cisco Investments portfolio.

Aug. 14, 2024: Cisco is cutting 6,000 jobs in its second round of layoffs this year and combining its networking, security and collaboration groups into one unit led by Jeetu Patel. Cisco wants to use this restructuring to pump more resources into three growth areas: AI networking, security and collaboration.

Aug. 09, 2024: A round of layoff announcements at Dell and Cisco are a result of both companies currently losing core market share to new industry competitors: Arista Networks for Cisco, in their core networking business, and low-cost PC manufacturers like Acer for Dell, an analyst said.

July 31, 2024: When companies increase IT/OT integration, they can simplify operations, boost security and streamline decision making, according to Cisco’s industrial networking research.

July 11, 2024: Cisco’s Talos security intelligence group analyzed ransomware groups to identify common techniques and provide insights for security teams to enhance their defense mechanisms against cyber threats.

July 09, 2024: With new leadership, strategic acquisitions, and a focus on AI-driven, platform-based solutions, Cisco is heavily investing in its security capabilities. Although Cisco’s prowess in network and telecommunications is renowned, its venture into the cybersecurity sphere is currently expanding.

June 07, 2024: Cisco launched a new certification program aimed at enhancing skills for designing AI and machine learning infrastructure. The Cisco Certified Design Expert (CCDE) AI Infrastructure certification, as explained by Cisco’s vice president of learning and certifications, Par Merat, is a vendor-neutral expert-level certification targeted at equipping IT professionals with capabilities to architect AI/ML compute and network systems effectively.

June 07, 2024: Following acquisitions of Splunk, AppDynamics, and ThousandEyes, Cisco is enhancing its full-stack observability capabilities. During the recent Cisco Live event, Cisco and Splunk executives outlined their strategy to deliver a “unified observability experience,” aimed at assisting customers in managing applications across different deployment environments including on-premises, hybrid, and multi-cloud settings.

June 05, 2024: Cisco put AI front and center at its Live event, touting new networking, management and security products. CEO Chuck Robbins says the AI evolution is coming on fast, like the cloud transition on steroids. “You’re probably trying to figure out use cases, if you are haven’t already, and how you can use it,” said Robbins in his keynote address.

May 30, 2024: Despite a recent rough patch, Cisco has growth opportunities on multiple fronts. Its strategy starts with the $28 billion acquisition of Splunk, a bold move that adds $4 billion in annual revenue to Cisco’s roughly $55 billion base. More importantly, it creates revenue-generating opportunities across a variety of fast-growing markets: security, observability, data analytics, AIOps, and genAI.

May 30, 2024: Cisco Meraki has rolled out 5G fixed wireless access gateways, and AT&T said it will use them to offer a new service for business branch offices. The new Meraki MG cellular MG52 and MG52E gateways fill out the high-end of Meraki’s cellular gateway family and offer 2 Gbps/300Mbp throughput – which is twice the throughput of current high-end MG offerings.

May 22, 2024: IT leaders need more help managing and securing their distributed networking environments, Cisco asserts in its Global Networking Trends Report. “Network architectures are more sophisticated, more complex, and spread across more multi-clouds and multi-vendors than ever. IT leaders are also besieged by rising cybersecurity risks, increased demand from new app and workload types, and vastly distributed workforces and infrastructures,” said Jonathan Davidson, executive vice president and general manager of Cisco networking.

May 16, 2024: Last year, Cisco discontinued its Hyperflex platform and passed on the reins to Nutanix. Currently, Cisco and Nutanix have greatly enhanced their partnership, incorporating new management features, AI tools, and network improvements to their combined hyperconverged infrastructure solution.

May 10, 2024: A newly introduced virtual appliance for Cisco’s AppDynamics observability platform offers enterprise users additional deployment choices and AI-powered functions for detecting anomalies, conducting root cause analysis, securing applications, and monitoring SAP.

May 07, 2024: Cisco has enhanced its cloud-native security platform with new AI-driven security capabilities, aimed at aiding customers in swiftly identifying and addressing security threats. These advancements are part of Cisco’s Panoptica platform, focused on securing cloud applications from their creation to deployment, emphasizing protection for containerized, microservice-oriented applications on environments like Kubernetes.

May 03, 2024: Cisco and Red Hat are deepening their long-standing strategic alliance, now enhancing aspects of networking, AI, and cloud integrations. During the Red Hat Summit 2024, they will showcase how the deep integration between Cisco’s Application Centric Infrastructure (ACI) and Red Hat’s OpenShift can optimize network operations for their clients.

May 02, 2024: Cisco is part of a group that backed security startup Corelight with $150 million in Series E funding. The new funding will enable Corelight to further develop its technology, which transforms network and cloud activity as well as packet capture into evidence that security teams use to proactively hunt for threats, accelerate response to incidents, gain network visibility, and create powerful analytics results, according to the startup.

April 18, 2024: Cisco announces AI-based Hypershield, a self-upgrading security fabric that’s designed to protect distributed applications, devices and data.

April 03, 2024: Data centers are notorious energy hogs, and the increase in heavy-duty networking and compute power required to handle AI workloads is only going to exacerbate the sustainability issue. But there are efforts underway to address the growth of AI and ML in data centers while keeping energy efficiency, cooling and performance in mind.

March 27, 2024: Security readiness among enterprises has dropped in the past year, while the confidence level of many organizations is up. This disparity between confidence levels and security readiness suggests that companies may be overestimating their ability to navigate the threat landscape, Cisco reports in its newly released Cybersecurity Readiness Index.

March 27, 2024: Cisco unveiled its hybrid work findings, indicating that 72% of workers are enthusiastic about returning to the office but they demand improved workspaces and updated collaborative technologies. The study points out that many office designs still prioritize solitary tasks rather than fostering environments conducive to group work, social exchanges, and innovative thinking. This survey involved feedback from 14,050 employees and 3,800 employers across 19 different countries.

March 25, 2024: Martin Lund has been appointed to spearhead the division focusing on the development of Cisco’s essential components like silicon, optics, and hardware for its primary networking functionalities.

March 21, 2024: Cisco and Intel have intensified their collaboration to enhance Wi-Fi connectivity and introduce new features suitable for applications requiring low latency.

March 20, 2024: Through the acquisition of Splunk and a collaboration with Nvidia, Cisco is targeting the creation of network infrastructures capable of supporting AI/ML workloads in data centers.

March 18, 2024: Cisco closed its $28 billion acquisition of Splunk, promising product innovations across its security, observability and AI portfolios with the integration of Splunk. Network security teams can use Splunk’s technology to gain better visibility into network traffic, firewalls, intrusion detection systems, and SIEM systems.

March 07, 2024: The bad actors who are perpetrating advanced persistent threat (APT) attacks aren’t just looking to access your network. They want to hang around to collect valuable data or lay plans for future attacks. Post-compromise threats are growing, Cisco says, and they’re aimed largely at aging network infrastructure and edge devices that are long past end-of-life stage and may have critical unpatched vulnerabilities. “… the older legacy components have more avenues for access, especially if the devices are out of support and they haven’t been updated in three or four years,” said Nick Biasini, head of outreach at Cisco’s Talos security research arm.

Feb. 29, 2024: Cisco has implemented a new blueprint that involves working more closely with partners to offer packages of networking and software components that meld IT elements with Internet of Things (IoT) and operational technology (OT).

Feb. 14, 2024: After days of speculation, Cisco announced a restructuring plan that will see the networking vendor cut 5%, or about 4,200 jobs, from its 84,900 workforce as it plans to continue to focus on high-strength areas such as AI and security.

Feb. 08, 2024: Cisco is launching a generative AI-based assistant to help customers handle cloud-native application security issues more quickly and efficiently. The Cisco AI Assistant for Panoptica will help businesses streamline, prioritize, and remediate risks and misconfigurations in multi-cloud environments, according to Vijoy Pandey, senior vice president of Cisco’s Outshift advanced development group.

Feb. 07, 2024: Cisco is delivering a cloud-based service that gives enterprise customers a centralized hub for managing AI elements. Called Motific, the service promises to help streamline and accelerate the creation, deployment and management of generative AI-based applications for the enterprise.

Feb. 06, 2024: Cisco and Nvidia have expanded their partnership to offer integrated software and networking hardware that promises to help customers more easily spin up infrastructure to support AI applications. The agreement deepens both companies’ strategy to expand the role of Ethernet networking for AI workloads in the enterprise. It also gives both companies access to each other’s sales and support systems.

Jan. 31, 2024: Cisco and Hitachi Vantara have unveiled the first fruits of their partnership, signed last year, that aims to bring managed as-a-service offerings to enterprise customers with hybrid cloud environments. The joint offering, Hitachi EverFlex with Cisco Powered Hybrid Cloud, includes a range of converged infrastructure services that meld compute, networking and software technologies from Cisco and storage capabilities from Hitachi.

Jan. 26, 2024: Cisco AppDynamics has introduced a new management tool designed to relieve operational teams managing an increasing number of application and infrastructure agents. The tool, Smart Agent for Cisco AppDynamics, provides features that allow users to identify and upgrade outdated software agents, as well as facilitate the onboarding and management of new agents via a unified interface, as announced by Cisco.

Jan. 25, 2024: Kyndryl has integrated Cisco’s Secure Access services into its latest managed services offerings. This enhancement includes advancements such as zero-trust network access, a secure web gateway, and a firewall provided as a service.

Jan. 24, 2024: In collaboration, Cisco and T-Mobile are providing a managed 5G connectivity solution tailored for remote locations and small business offices. This service, branded as Connected Workplace, utilizes Cisco Meraki’s 5G cellular gateways in conjunction with its network management and visibility tools. Features include a centralized Meraki dashboard and cloud-managed security, complemented by T-Mobile’s comprehensive national business internet service, delivering broad connectivity options for a range of devices and applications.

Jan. 22, 2024: Cisco’s ventures into quantum networking, focusing primarily on security applications, are poised to yield practical applications soon, as highlighted by Liz Centoni, a top executive at Cisco. These developments are foundational to transitioning quantum networking from experimental stages to real-world utilization.

Jan. 17, 2024: Cisco’s acquisition of startup Isovalent, developer of open-source tools Cilium and Tetragon, underscores the potential of the popular eBPF kernel technology for multicloud networking and security.

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