Cisco has revealed its customer-centric strategy to improve the overall viewpoint of customer experience.
In its quarterly report on Wednesday, the technology company revealed several high-value investments in its AI products.
In the earnings call, Cisco emphasized that this rapid growth in AI product adoption indicates a rising demand for secure networking.
Customer-Centric Strategy
Over the past year, Cisco’s quarterly results have demonstrated high levels of growth after several previous declines, and it is now reaping the benefits of its increased customer spending and investment.
This has included various AI products and suites, as well as investments in data centers to support the demands for AI-driven workloads and cloud networking.
However, the attention has turned towards its customers and their willingness to adopt these products into their workflows.
Despite this growth in demand, a Cisco study revealed that only a third of companies are certain that their IT infrastructure can safely integrate their AI projects, which Cisco views as favorable for them.
With its extensive networking portfolio, the company believes it is on track to deliver the critical infrastructure to its customer enterprises, enabling them to adapt to the AI era.
Modernizing Customer Experience
In response to the study, Cisco has acknowledged that many companies are still far off from where they’ve been expected to be with AI.
Charles Robbins, CEO and Chairman at Cisco, recognized the readiness gap between planning and execution when it came to adopting AI.
He said:
“We know many customers still have a lot of work to do to ensure they have the modern, scalable, secure networking infrastructure to support their AI goals.”
Cisco has already begun its move toward a modernized customer experience through various upgrades and expansions, allowing for simpler large-scale AI deployments.
This has included its global network and infrastructure upgrades, allowing Cisco to enhance its enterprise switching, routing, and Wi-Fi to conduct large-scale AI and data-intensive workloads with fast, scalable, and secure performance.
From this, Cisco expects its enterprise customers to switch from legacy networking equipment to its newer systems, collectively spending billions as part of its multiyear, multibillion-dollar refresh opportunity.
With global data expansion, Cisco has established numerous regional data centers worldwide, as well as a European customer-based sovereign critical infrastructure portfolio, focusing on a global scale-up with region-focused deployments.
By supplying software and cloud-native transformation, customer enterprises can also receive automated network surveillance and deliver secure, scalable customer experiences.
In addition, Cisco offers end-to-end security integrated into the network, supporting modernized infrastructure for reliable and capable traffic pattern management.
Workloads with Agentic AI
Cisco’s earnings call reported a surge in agentic AI activity, with the number of queries through agentic AI measuring at 25x higher in network traffic than chatbots.
And demand for AI has increased with it, with Cisco expecting AI infrastructure to generate $3BN in revenue for fiscal year 2026.
A contributing factor is the AI workloads needing the necessary models and infrastructure to process locally. To support this, Cisco announced the release of its Unified Edge last week, as part of its strategy to process AI at a speedier and secure level.
This platform offers integration for compute, networking, and storage into one system, enabling enterprises to receive real-time predictions and decisions for secure AI management.
Another recent release is the Cisco Data Fabric architecture, which allows for the unification and management of various machine data sources, enabling companies to create more innovative AI models, adding to Cisco’s value when it comes to technology investments.
Cisco Webex Winter 2025
Cisco has also published its Webex Winter 2025 press release, detailing its recent updates in CX technologies.
Some key results from the season include: AI translation capabilities now expanding to 120 languages for meeting summaries; its regional cloud infrastructure locations such as the UK, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, and the UAE; a 3D workspace designer for visual blueprints; and AI Assistant for Calling for live and post-meeting summaries.
These help to enable higher productivity levels, improve global coverage, and drive flexible working systems, with Webex allowing customers to use meeting rooms, calls, and contact center through one platform.
However, not all these features are available for deployment as of yet.
In conversation with CX Today, Tim Banting, Head of Research at Techtelligence, discussed Cisco’s decision to strengthen its overall CX stack across AI, global scale, and device flexibility.
He said, “The move aligns with current Techtelligence buying-intent data showing a 19% rise in enterprise research around UC productivity and automation, involving more than 29,000 companies actively investigating process and workflow automation in communications suites.
“However, Cisco faces an execution challenge. Several key AI and automation capabilities remain in the “coming soon” category, creating a perception gap in a market that rewards immediacy and credibility.
“Techtelligence data shows that buyers are rewarding vendors delivering deployable automation and measurable risk controls now – not future roadmap promises.
He added: “For CX buyers, the practical value lies in features that are globally available and compliance-ready today. The platform consolidation trend is undeniable.
“Cisco’s success will hinge on whether it can deliver AI responsibly, at scale, and ahead of rivals who are already reshaping perception around “secure AI collaboration.”
Cisco Key Earnings Results
After enterprise customers’ strong demand for its AI products, Cisco has risen above estimates for the quarter.
- Cisco’s revenue is up to $14.9BN, increasing 8% year-over-year
- Its product orders are up 13% year-over-year, with growth across all markets and geographies
- AI infrastructures currently stand at $1.3BN
- Service revenue increased by approximately 2%
- Product revenue increased by approximately 10%
