Smarter Switching for AI with Cisco Enterprise Networking

The foundational goal of campus switching (providing connectivity to users and endpoints) remains unchanged, but the ecosystem it serves is undergoing rapid transformation driven by evolving applications and devices. Kenny Lei, a Technical Marketing Engineer at Cisco, highlighted the pervasive influence of AI tools like ChatGPT and GitHub Copilot, the surging adoption of Wi-Fi 7 for its increased bandwidth and user density, and the emerging security challenges posed by quantum computing. These trends necessitate a campus network capable of handling dramatically increased, often symmetric, data traffic, with higher performance, lower latency, and robust security.

To address these demands, Cisco has introduced its new “Smart Switch” series, featuring the Catalyst 9350 for access layers and the Catalyst 9610 for aggregation. The Catalyst 9350 offers high Power over Ethernet (90W) and 10Gbps copper ports, complemented by multiple 100Gbps uplinks, significantly reducing oversubscription and ensuring optimal performance for latency-sensitive AI applications. The modular Catalyst 9610, with up to 25 Terabits of performance and support for hundreds of 100Gbps ports (with future 400Gbps capabilities), serves as a high-capacity core. Both platforms are powered by Cisco Silicon One A6 ASICs, which use a virtual output queuing (VOQ) architecture to prevent head-of-line blocking and support up to seven queues for granular traffic prioritization. This intelligent design, coupled with a hybrid buffer memory system, ensures that latency-sensitive traffic is processed swiftly while bulk data transfers avoid packet drops even under congestion.

Cisco emphasizes that security is embedded in the network fabric, featuring Trust Anchor Modules (TAMs) for hardware and software integrity, IPsec/MACsec for secure transport, and a zero-trust model powered by Security Group Tags (SGTs) and the Identity Services Engine (ISE) for continuous authentication and policy enforcement. The new switches also enhance visibility and policy management through HCAM (a combination of TCAM and SRAM), enabling efficient NetFlows and ACLs while significantly reducing resource consumption. Furthermore, the enhanced CPU and memory on these smart switches allow for hosting AI workloads closer to the edge, fostering distributed intelligence and faster processing. Operational efficiency is boosted by innovations such as the eXpress Forwarding Software Upgrade (XFSU), which minimizes outage time during updates by separating the control and data planes and offloading critical processes. Cisco also integrates AI into network operations through an AI Assistant in the Meraki dashboard, streamlining day-zero, day-one, and day-N tasks from inventory management and troubleshooting to compliance checks, ensuring a high-performance, secure, and quantum-ready network infrastructure for the AI era.