At Partner Summit, Cisco celebrates an unmatched global ecosystem, exciting new products, and shared opportunities.More RSS Feeds: https:\/\/newsroom.cisco.com\/c\/r\/newsroom\/en\/us\/rss-feeds.html<\/p>\n

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At Cisco\u2019s Partner Summit event in Miami this week, a key theme was \u201cGreater Together.\u201d And that core message was confirmed over and over.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

As Cisco\u2019s EVP and chief customer and partner officer Jeff Sharritts shared, fully 92 percent of Cisco\u2019s business last quarter came through partners. And that was up from around 50 percent when Sharritts started with Cisco in 2000.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But the importance of partnering together goes beyond sales (as critical as they are!).\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe world is changing rapidly,\u201d Sharritts said. \u201cParadigms are shifting and being completely rewritten. There are new opportunities, new challenges, new ways to sell and new buying centers to sell into. Greater Together speaks to all of that. It honors our past. It shines a light on our opportunity, but more than anything, it\u2019s a call to action.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

That call to action aligns to what technology can accomplish in a world beset by critical problems \u2014 and what Cisco\u2019s vast global partner ecosystem can continue to accomplish.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve come together to make the world better,\u201d Sharritts continued. \u201cOur technology solutions and expertise help countries fight poverty. We’ve rebuilt and built communities around the world with our technology. We’ve made health care and education better. We make critical infrastructure stronger and financial services more secure. We build what really matters and I’m very proud to be a part of this community.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Along with steep challenges, opportunities abound. Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins outlined the massive value at stake in coming years \u2014 all contingent on powerful innovation and committed teamwork.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the same time that we have all these challenges in the world,\u201d he said, \u201cWe also have tremendous opportunities. Generative AI, which came on the scene months ago, is going to add $4.4 trillion to global GDP on an annual basis. The global enterprise software market, $517 billion in the next five, six years, a trillion dollars on future of work.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Robbins emphasized that those opportunities can only be realized with partnerships.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cOur customers know that they need our partners,\u201d he added. \u201cOne of our analyst partners recently reported that 60 percent of our customers said they need to expand the number of partners they work with because they need your expertise, they need your capabilities to deal with all the complexities that they have that they\u2019re dealing with today.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Fueling great partnerships with innovative technology\u00a0<\/h3>\n

Of course, great technology is the foundation for successful partnerships. And Partner Summit featured no shortage of amazing innovation.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

As Liz Centoni, Cisco EVP, chief strategy officer and GM for applications, said, \u201cwe\u2019ve got the best partner ecosystem on the planet. And our innovation is coming to life in the best portfolio I\u2019ve ever seen.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

To that end, Centoni shared critical Cisco advances in the areas of hyperconnectivity, quantum networking, security, and AI. But all roads lead back to cloud, specifically the highly distributed multicloud environments in which so many of today\u2019s organizations operate, and, sometimes, struggle.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the top priorities of our customers is how do I operate in this hybrid multi-cloud world?\u201d she recounted. \u201cWe have solutions for those, so today we can actually securely connect our customers from their branch campus and data center to the cloud with our cloud on-ramp solution. With multi-cloud defense, we can enforce consistent security policies across public in private clouds from a single place, and with full-stack observability, we can observe applications regardless of which cloud they\u2019re actually on.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

AI has transformed nearly everything Cisco does today, and Centoni shared one of Cisco\u2019s key advantages.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cTo really get the biggest benefit from AI, you need massive amounts of quality data,\u201d she explained. \u201cThere\u2019s very few companies on this planet that have that now. AI has used it pervasively across our portfolio.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Jonathan Davidson, EVP and GM for Cisco networking, picked up on the theme.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cAI and secure connectivity will make humankind more productive, more sustainable, more profitable,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is going to accelerate as all of you help connect billions of people and trillions of things over the next five, 10, and 20 years. You all have the insights to identify new adopters and inspire them to reinvent themselves.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

One area where AI is showing is value in cutting complexity. Networking and security in multicloud environments are more convoluted than ever before. But Cisco is building a simple user experience, with AI-powered platforms like Networking Cloud.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are simplifying networking everywhere for every customer at every scale,\u201d Davidson stressed. \u201cWe are converging our management platforms with the Cisco Networking Cloud, which is our vision for both on-premise as well as cloud operating models. This is going to help you manage your customer’s Cisco networking infrastructure products from one place, help them to deliver secure, simple, predictable experiences to all of their end users.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Thwarting hackers with powerful but simple security\u00a0\u00a0<\/h3>\n

Every organization worries about security. And Jeetu Patel, Cisco EVP and general manager of security and collaboration, described the tangled web of security solutions and vendors that add additional anxieties.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s about 3,500 vendors in the market on average,\u201d Patel said. \u201cMost companies have about 50 to 70 products within their cybersecurity stack. And it\u2019s frankly getting to be untenable.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Cutting through that multilayered complexity is another integrated, AI-powered platform: Cisco Security Cloud.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cCisco Security Cloud,\u201d Patel explained, \u201cis going to be three specific things. We’re going to protect the user. We’re going to protect cloud and cloud infrastructure, and we’re going to go out and protect against a breach that might occur and detect, respond, and remediate that breach as quickly as possible. And all of that’s going to be built on the foundation of firewall.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

While sharing Cisco\u2019s current security products, Patel became even more excited at the prospect of combining them with Splunk, the cutting-edge organization at the intersection of security that Cisco recently announced will be its biggest ever acquisition.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are brand new products that we\u2019ve built from the ground up,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd then we\u2019ll combine that with the power of Splunk. There\u2019s something really, really potent here that’s going to be really exciting to go out and take to market over the course of the next few years.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Hybrid work and sustainability, where opportunity abounds\u00a0<\/h3>\n

In his keynote, Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins shared the huge opportunity represented by hybrid work, and Jeetu Patel picked up the theme in a Day 2 presentation. Sharing Cisco\u2019s focus on reimaging work, reimagining workspaces, and reimagining customer experience (via Webex Call Center), he shared some great new innovations on the Webex platform.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve completely reimagined the Webex platform with AI,\u201d he stressed, adding that \u201cwe\u2019ve spent a couple of billion dollars in building out a very solid AI infrastructure.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Among the innovations that Patel highlighted were solutions that use generative AI to compensate for low bandwidth.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have fundamentally re-imagined how a voice stream can get encoded, transmitted and decoded,\u201d Patel explained, \u201cup to 16 times more efficiency than the industry standard codex \u2014 16 times more.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe solved audio,\u201d Patel continued, \u201cbut now we are going to use generative AI also for the video sites. \u2026\u00a0 So, it takes a fraction of the amount of bandwidth that you need, but you get a better resolution picture on the other end than what you even transmitted originally.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

On the IT end of collaboration, Patel discussed Webex Control Hub, which, integrated with Cisco solutions like ThousandEyes, gives precise insights into network performance, troubleshooting, and energy usage \u2014 all accessible with a highly intuitive AI assistant.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Of course, sustainability is another key concern for all organizations, and Jonathan Davidson returned to confirm Cisco\u2019s commitment to helping partners and customers on their own sustainability journeys.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re investing in innovation, we\u2019re investing in circular IT programs, and we are investing in you with programs, training tools, and enablement for a solid sustainability practice that you can all run,\u201d he said. \u201cCisco uniquely fits the bill to help you win because sustainability starts at the intersection between the network and energy.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

He then focused on one innovation, the powerful Silicon One chip, which is transforming infrastructures while helping to reduce IT energy demands, which he stated have accounted for 2 to 4 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWith Silicon One, we make the possibilities of AI an absolute reality,\u201d Davidson said. \u201cAnd the Nexus 9,000 Silicon One has been shown to be 59 times more energy efficient than previous versions. That is so powerful.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Silicon One, and all the other great innovations shared, gain ever greater impact when amplified across Cisco\u2019s partner ecosystem. And Jeff Sharritts bought it home with a concluding message.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cLet\u2019s keep innovating,\u201d he concluded, \u201clet\u2019s keep collaborating and let\u2019s show every customer, every competitor, and every person that follows technology that we are greater together.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

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\u200bCisco Newsroom: Enterprise Networking\u00a0At Partner Summit, Cisco celebrates an unmatched global ecosystem, exciting new products, and shared opportunities.More RSS Feeds: https:\/\/newsroom.cisco.com\/c\/r\/newsroom\/en\/us\/rss-feeds.html\u00a0<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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