Cisco: AI driving a ‘network supercycle’

The shift toward AI and barrage of new, traffic-generating agentic AI systems, that will soon need a much higher and more integrated layer of security mechanisms, will require significant changes at data centers, on service provider networks and throughout other parts of the telecom ecosystem, a pair of top Cisco execs said Tuesday at the company’s annual Cisco Live event in Las Vegas.

“We are entering into a network supercycle,” Jeetu Patel, Cisco’s president and chief product officer, said during the event’s opening keynote session.

Much of the talk centered on the needs and requirements of agentic AI systems that will employ potentially trillions of virtual agents to handle a multitude of tasks for enterprises and individuals, and will connect to and interact with other agents.

Echoing elements of a recently released Cisco report on how AI will impact network traffic, Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins noted that network traffic associated with AI is currently expected to triple within the…