Cisco and NVIDIA jointly launch AI deployment solution

Cisco will invest $1 billion in AI and launch a new networking solution with NVIDIA’s AI infrastructure, the organization announced at its annual consumer event on June 4. Cisco Live will be held in Las Vegas from June 2 to 6. These and other announcements at Cisco Live respond to the trend of enterprises adopting AI with improved visibility and security.

Cisco and NVIDIA Collaborate on Nexus HyperFabric AI Cluster

Cisco and NVIDIA have launched a new networking solution called Cisco Nexus HyperFabric AI Cluster, which is designed to provide smooth access to AI for customers who may not have AI deployment or IT skills. Cisco Nexus HyperFabric AI Cluster can be used to deploy, manage, and monitor Generative AI provide infrastructure to businesses.

“While the promise of AI is bright, the path forward is unclear for many companies just getting started,” Jonathan Davidson, executive vice president and general manager of Cisco Networking, said in a report. “Customers often face economic and operational challenges in getting an AI stack up and running.” Press release“Cisco is committed to making it easier to deploy and operate AI infrastructure.”

See: UALink Promotion Team is committed to creating AI Infrastructure Standards – Notably, there is no NVIDIA.

The idea is that organizations need guidance to deploy AI infrastructure. So the Nexus HyperFabric AI Cluster solution combines Cisco Ethernet switching and cloud management options with NVIDIA AI Enterprise software, NVIDIA NIM inference microservices, NVIDIA Tensor Core GPUS, VAST data platform, and more.

It is expected to be generally available in the fourth quarter of 2024, with some customers able to gain access in early fourth quarter.

To further help IT teams run generative AI, Cisco offers training on AI infrastructure. The CCDE AI Infrastructure certification is available from Cisco Learning and Certification.

AI investments are just beginning: Cisco launches global fund

Cisco has invested $1 billion in the artificial BroadCast Unitedligence sector through its global investment fund, which promises to support startups and generative AI solutions. Cohere, Mistral AI, and Scale AI will receive Cisco’s funding as strategic partners. Cisco has invested $200 million in the fund so far.

Cisco announces enhanced security capabilities for cloud, web apps, and more

Cisco announced enhancements to existing security products:

• The Firewall 1200 Series will be available in October 2024, eliminating the need for enterprise branch offices to equip multiple devices for switches, routers, and firewalls.
• Security Cloud Control, the management framework for Cisco Security Cloud that provides an AI overview for Cisco Security Firewall, Security Firewall Threat Defense, Security Firewall ASA, MultiCloud Defense, and Hypershield, will be available in September.
• Splunk Technology Add-on for Cisco Acquired in MarchThis includes new sources of Cisco telemetry in Splunk for the Security Operations Center. These will be available in the coming months.
• Firewall Threat Defense 7.6 for all Cisco firewalls.
• Google Chrome Enterprise provides threat and data protection for all web applications protected by Cisco Secure Access.

AMD Pensado DPUs and Intel Infrastructure Add Support for Cisco Hypershield

Cisco Hypershield, a security architecture launched by the company in April 2024 that extends security enforcement to virtual machines or Kubernetes clusters, will soon be available for some new services. AMD Pensando DPUs will support Cisco Hypershield by the end of 2024, starting with Cisco Unified Computing System servers. By the end of this year, AMD Pensando DPU support for Hypershield will be extended to other server vendors and Intel infrastructure processing units.

“By leveraging our DPUs in customer servers or future Cisco networking platforms, Hypershield users can enjoy high-capacity throughput and BroadCast Unitedligent policy enforcement without compromising workload performance,” Soni Jiandani, general manager of AMD’s Networking Technologies and Solutions Group, wrote in a press release.

ThousandEyes Visibility Engine Powers Digital Experience Assurance

ThousandEyes is a device management visibility engine that Cisco acquired in 2020. Now, Cisco has added ThousandEyes’ AI alerts to Digital Experience Assurance in Cisco Network Cloud. ThousandEyes draws information from across the Cisco ecosystem to provide proactive recommendations and sends device and telemetry data to customers’ domain controllers and management systems.

ThousandEyes can now map AWS environments, display a unified view of external and internal network conditions across Cisco and non-Cisco network platforms in Traffic Insights, and get Meraki Wi-Fi and LAN telemetry and device information. ThousandEyes is further collaborating with Meraki to enhance the Meraki Assurance overview.

TechRepublic is covering Cisco Live remotely.