Cisco unveiled new cloud management networking and unified tech capabilities at Cisco Live across its Meraki, Catalyst and Nexus product portfolio. The company also announced a new ThousandEyes product geared at proactively forecasting and optimizing WAN performance.
There are a number of challenges Cisco is looking to address: Overwhelmingly complex IT environments, higher than ever user expectations and a growing number of diverse connections that businesses rely on.
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“This has resulted in a network and overall IT experience that is more fragmented, less secure and increasingly difficult to scale,’’ the company said.
Cloud Management for Cisco Catalyst is designed to give customers the option to bring Meraki Cloud to their existing Catalyst deployments. The new Cisco Nexus Cloud SaaS offering aims to simplify IT by providing a cloud-managed platform for cloud networking.
Because today’s business environment is unpredictable, organizations depend on digital experiences to keep their workforces productive and ensure they are exceeding expectations for customers and partners, Cisco said. Unified systems that bridge an organization’s technologies, locations, teams and devices will help IT teams build business greater productivity, agility and resiliency,.
“Our customers choose to run their businesses on Cisco technology because we sit at the intersection of networking, security and cloud,” said Todd Nightingale, executive vice president and general manager of Cisco enterprise networking and cloud, in a statement. “We believe the network is the foundation for the modern enterprise and must deliver agility through simplicity.”
The future is cloud managed
Cisco said it is advancing its networking platforms so customers can securely and logically transition toward more cloud-based operating models.
Cloud Management for Cisco Catalyst is designed to let customers monitor select Catalyst switches and manage select Catalyst wireless devices through the Meraki dashboard. The goal is to bring increased visibility and flexibility to the customer experience, Cisco said.
Cisco Nexus Cloud is a cloud-managed platform delivered as a service that aims to provide an easy way to deploy, manage and operate cloud networking. Nexus Cloud is powered by Cisco Intersight and is designed to extend customers’ ability to manage across public cloud, private cloud and edge computing environments of any size or scale, the company said.
Cisco Nexus Cloud is targeted for availability in the fall of 2022.
A vision for predictive networks
Cisco said it is aware that driving superior digital experiences matters more today than ever.
“Poor customer or employee experiences leave lasting and damaging impressions,” the company said. “IT teams need access to offerings that will allow them to shift away from reacting to networking issues and instead be proactive to prevent the issues impacting their business.”
Cisco’s ThousandEyes WAN Insights is the company’s first step toward delivering on its predictive networks vision, with the goal of empowering enterprise IT to move from reactive to preventative-based networking, improving operational efficiency and assurance of application experience, Cisco said.
ThousandEyes WAN Insights is designed to proactively alert IT teams to issues before they happen and harm user experience, offering policy recommendations and path optimization guidance.
Cisco said ThousandEyes WAN Insights will soon be available to its SD-WAN customers.
Simplifying security at the network edge
At last week’s RSA Conference, Cisco also unveiled a unified Secure Access Service Edge offering. Cisco+ Secure Connect Now is an as-a-service, cloud-managed offering available to customers via a single subscription.
It is designed to provide customers with a SASE product that is quick to deploy and easy to manage, and can simplify how organizations connect and protect users, things and applications, Cisco said.
