Why organizations in Asia need to start thinking about AI networking modernization

At the Cisco Partner Summit, Cisco introduced its latest routers and access points, which the vendor said will empower distributed organizations and prepare such businesses to handle more AI workloads.

During the Cisco Partner Summit in San Diego, the netowk and security vendor highlighted that organizations around the world will be heading towards modernizing their networks, especially as they look to run more AI workloads. The AI networking modernization is expected to drive demand not just for modern networking but also for secure networking.

Given this scenario, the Cisco Unified Egde, which was unveiled at the summit, extends data center power and scale to the edge, to where real-time applications and AI inferencing data are generated.

The platform, which is modular and cloud managed, integrates compute, networking, storage and security into a single system for businesses and channel partners to simplify AI workload management. It is supported by an extensive partner ecosystem that includes third-party vendors such as Nutanix, VMware, and Microsoft.

The platform has been infused with Cisco Intersight, which allows Cisco to extend the same operational model used in the data center all the way to the edge, according to Jeremy Foster, Senior Vice President and General Manager of Cisco Compute.

On the networking and wireless connectivity front, Cisco introduced its latest routers and access points, which the vendor said will empower distributed organizations and prepare such businesses to handle more AI workloads.

Cisco is adding to its secure 8000 router series with two new offerings: the 8200 and 8400 Series Secure Routers that will pair high-performance routing, a built-in firewall and ultra-low latency for medium to large campus deployments for seamless and automated connectivity.

The new Wi-Fi 7 access points—the CW9171I and CW9174—along with the new CW9800L Wireless Controller are designed for low- and medium-density deployments and offer high throughput, low latency, and intelligent management for seamless scale. New wireless assurance capabilities include Roaming Health and the upcoming Cisco ThousandEyes Active Testing for Wireless APs for increased visibility, faster troubleshooting, and optimized performance.

AI network modernization in Asia

In Asia, Ben Dawson SVP and President for APJC at Cisco, believes that this scenario would vary from market to market. For example, there are some markets that are in a phase to modernize. However, there’s also a lot of tech debt that has been made over the past few years, which they need to modernize.

In other markets, some of the more emerging economies, they're saying they need to build infrastructure as an opportunity to leapfrog the more developed peers. Dawson believes these markets are looking at how do they use AI to create industries and create opportunities for them as an economy that they haven't had in the past.

“More mature markets are looking at how do they embrace AI into existing models and build outs. The drivers are a little different, but in either case, that's going to require modernization of the infrastructure. And I think one of the trends I see consistently is the infrastructure is more critical than ever. There's always been critical industries, banking and finance, healthcare and defence. But every organization now sees that core infrastructure as a critical asset. When the infrastructure is impacted or goes down, it has profound effects on a business in a way that I don't think we've seen before. So that is driving this need, reinvestment and reprioritization of infrastructure,” Dawson explained.

Interestingly, as organizations look to modernize their infrastructure, one of the challenges they are also facing is figuring out what’s the best infrastructure that works for them, especially from a lifecyle viewpoint.

According to Foster, that’s the dilemma most organizations are facing right now. On one hand, Foster said that these organizations have systems that run their business today - stable, proven, and critical. On the other hand, he believes AI is changing everything about how and where workloads run.

“The question isn’t just what to invest in, it’s how to invest wisely over time. Customers need flexibility to support needs today, while adapting to the demands at the edge over the next decade. That’s why we designed Cisco Unified Edge the way we did. It lets you run traditional workloads and new AI workloads side by side, in one modular system. You can start small, grow as you need to, and know your investment will last. Bridging the gap between your needs today and demands of tomorrow,” Foster said.

With additional reporting from Gina Narcisi.