Cisco Live: Building Out Data Center Capacity for the Agentic AI Era

The buzz from Cisco Live is all about AI, notably moving from the generative AI and chatbots of the past few years to driving a sledgehammer-driven stake in the ground with agentic AI.   

Cisco is effectively positioning themselves, according to CRN, as “the infrastructure provider for the ‘agentic AI era’” and they’re paving the way by “focusing on building out data center capacity that can handle the sustained, perpetual inferencing demands of autonomous AI agents.”  

To claim their stake, Cisco—and Logicalis as one of six Cisco Global Gold partners—have embedded new AI enhancements into just about every product and introduced new AI-powered products to help you derive real value from next-generation networks, security, observability, and collaboration. Even better? As of now, there is no additional cost to customers.  

The foundation for Cisco’s position is built on these four AI-powered pillars:  agentic AI, next-generation networks, transformational security, and future-ready data centers.  

“From my perspective, it felt like the most Cisco announcements that I've heard out of the 10 years that I've gone to Cisco Live…and it’s all about AI.”

- Corey Smith, Solution Architect/Collaboration & Networked Solutions 

Seen at Cisco Live: Welcome to the era of agentic AI 

Many of us haven’t heard the term “agentic,” but it simply means to act independently to achieve outcomes. Add AI and now it refers to technologies that can autonomously make decisions and take actions to achieve complex goals, but with limited human supervision. Welcome to the era of agentic AI.  

Cisco has introduced new devices to power campus, branch, and industrial networks with AI-powered unified management that takes network management from reactive to proactive.  

They also announced AI-driven tools to simplify and automate IT operations, including an industry-first generative user interface for real-time collaboration between network and security operations teams. Key tools include Cisco AI Assistant, Cisco AI Canvas, and Cisco Deep Learning. 

Securing agentic AI will continue to challenge ops teams as AI-driven threats proliferate. To that end, Cisco has: 

• Embedded AI innovations across its Hybrid Mesh Firewall and Universal Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA) offerings,
• Announced new 6100 series and 200 series firewalls with best-in-class price performance, and
• Unveiled Cisco Security Cloud capabilities to help you more readily adopt secure agentic AI.  

Read the full press release to see all the ways that we can help you adapt and derive more value from AI investments.  

“I’ve been working with Cisco for almost 26 years, and I’ve never seen them this attentive to what’s going on. With some of their new networking announcements, they’re paying attention.” 

- Mark Frye, Director/Cisco Alliance 

Seen at Cisco Live: Future-ready network architectures 

The stakes are high with explosive traffic growth, complexity, new security threats, costlier downtime, and taxed IT teams. According to the Cisco IT Networking Leader Survey, 97% of businesses believe they need to upgrade their networks for successful AI and IoT initiatives.  

Cisco continues to meet the moment with a future-ready network architecture to power campus, branch, and industrial networks: 

• Unified management of Meraki and Catalyst devices on an AgenticOps-powered platform supporting cloud, on-prem, and hybrid deployments.
• Purpose-built networking devices with low latency, high capacity, and robust security:
• Cisco C9350 and C9610 Smart Switches for campus networks
• Cisco 8100, 8200, 8300, 8400 and 8500 secure routers
• Expanded Wi-Fi 7 portfolio with Cisco Wireless 9179F Series Access Points for stadiums and large venues 
• Expanded industrial portfolio with new ruggedized switches for applications like visual quality inspections and autonomous mobile robots.
• Advanced security capabilities to secure network infrastructure, encrypt data in transit, and protect every device and application across the network. 

Read the full Cisco press release to learn more about more secure, AI-enhanced network architectures.  

Seen at Cisco Live: Transformational, agentic AI era security  

As the good guys lean into AI for greater operational advantage, the bad guys lean into AI to launch more nefarious threats. Cisco is reimagining zero trust with solutions for AI-ready data centers and campus networks, featuring the new Cisco Hybrid Mesh Firewall and Universal Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA). (Learn more about the Hybrid Mesh Firewall here.)  

Universal ZTNA simplifies secure connectivity and improves visibility across hybrid environments and AI agents. Cisco SD-WAN offerings now integrate seamlessly with Cisco Secure Access so that you can choose the best branch connectivity yet still have consistent SSE policy and enforcement. Duo’s new passwordless options and proximity verification provide end-to-end phishing resistance. Cisco is also embedding secure agentic identities, seamless zero-trust access, and comprehensive agent tracking into its universal zero trust architecture to overcome security and safety issues of agentic AI.  

Finally, Cisco has enlisted Splunk to help security teams with new integrations that deliver new threat detection, investigation, and response (TDIR) capabilities for enhanced visibility, faster detection, and streamlined response.    

Read more about Cisco’s transformational security innovations for the agentic AI era.  

Seen at Cisco Live: AI-ready data centers, from hyperscale to enterprise 

As billions of AI agents emerge, demand is rising for high-bandwidth, low-latency, energy-efficient data center networking. Cisco delivers secure, advanced networking as the backbone for scalable, AI-ready data centers that: 

• Accelerate AI adoption with solutions like expanded AI PODs, unified Nexus Dashboard management, and the first Cisco/NVIDIA Spectrum-X Ethernet integration for efficient AI workloads.
• Lead next-gen AI infrastructure with key neocloud partnerships, making secure networking central to AI innovation.
• Modernize networks with Agile Services Networking, enabling service providers to monetize AI services and deliver reliable, high-performance AI connectivity. 

Verdict: Logicalis customers rock! 

Cisco Live isn’t just about new products and features. It’s also a chance for us to meet and talk with our Cisco customers at our exclusive, Logicalis-hosted customer event. With more than 100 customers stopping by to say hi, the energy in the room was palpable!  

Logicalis US CEO Jon Groves, who we think gets his super-hero powers from our customers, made it his mission to stop and talk to just about every customer. As he said, “I don’t always get the opportunity to talk to so many of our great customers in one place, but when I do, I learn so much from them and appreciate just being able to ask how they’re doing and what we can do to be better.”  

If you were at Cisco Live (or even if you weren’t), it’s clear that Cisco is reimagining the data center for the AI era. The question is…what should you do next? 

First, take a good hard look at your infrastructure. Are there ways to modernize it to accommodate AI or other features? How will you prioritize these opportunities given your time, talent, and budget? We’re here to help you sort it all out and put you on the right path for your organization. Contact us  

- Corey Smith, Solution Architect, Collaboration & Network Solutions, Logicalis US
- Mark Frye, Director, Cisco Alliance, Logicalis US