Cisco introduced major advancements to accelerate secure, scalable AI across market segments. Leading the announcements is the Cisco N9100, the first NVIDIA partner-developed data center switch based on NVIDIA Spectrum-X Ethernet switch silicon.
With this switch, Cisco is offering an NVIDIA Cloud Partner-compliant reference architecture for Neocloud and sovereign cloud deployments. For enterprise customers, Cisco Secure AI Factory with NVIDIA strengthened protection and visibility across AI deployments with new security and observability integrations. To pave the way for next-generation connectivity in the telecom industry, Cisco, NVIDIA, and additional partners unveiled the industry’s first AI-native wireless stack for 6G.
“We’re at the beginning of the largest data center build-out in history,” said Jeetu Patel, President and Chief Product Officer, Cisco. “The infrastructure that will power the agentic AI applications and innovation of the future requires new architectures designed to overcome today’s constraints in power, computing, and network performance. Together, Cisco and NVIDIA are leading the way in defining the technologies that will power these AI-ready data centers in all their varieties, from emerging neoclouds to global service providers to enterprises and beyond.”
“NVIDIA Spectrum-X Ethernet delivers the performance of accelerated networking for Ethernet,” said Gilad Shainer, SVP of Networking at NVIDIA. “Working with Cisco’s Cloud Reference Architectures and NVIDIA Cloud Partner design principles, customers can choose to deploy Spectrum-X Ethernet using the newest Cisco N9100 series or Cisco Silicon One-based switches to build open, high-performance AI networks.”
A Portfolio for Any AI Workload
Back-end and front-end Ethernet-based networks must be flexible enough to keep pace with rapid AI innovation, integrate seamlessly with existing infrastructure, and be simple to deploy and manage. Orderable before the end of the year, the Cisco N9100 series switches offer a choice of Cisco NX-OS or SONiC operating systems, advancing Ethernet for AI networks and offering greater flexibility in how neocloud and sovereign cloud customers build their AI infrastructure.
Additionally, for neocloud and sovereign cloud customers, the Cisco Cloud Reference Architecture is based on the design tenets of NVIDIA’s Cloud Partner reference architecture and utilizes Cisco’s Silicon One and Cloud-scale ASIC offerings. The reference architecture will also include the recently introduced Cisco 8223 based on the Silicon One P200 for scale-across networks, NVIDIA BlueField-4 DPUs, and NVIDIA ConnectX-9 SuperNICs.
“The real challenge in AI infrastructure isn’t just performance—it’s maintaining operational sanity as you scale from dozens to thousands of GPUs. Cisco’s approach with NX-OS and Nexus Dashboard creates a single pane of glass across our entire AI fabric, whether we’re optimizing inference latency in the front-end or maximizing training throughput in the back-end. That operational simplicity translates directly to faster deployments and lower TCO.” – Xiaohe Hu, CEO, Infrawaves
The First AI-native Wireless Stack—with Cisco at its Core
As AI moves from smartphones to more connected things—augmented reality glasses, connected cars and robotics—wireless networks face mounting demand to support billions of connections at unprecedented scale and efficiency. To meet this challenge, Cisco, NVIDIA, and additional telecom partners have developed the first American AI-RAN stack for mobile networks that integrates sensing and communication, with multiple pre-6G applications being showcased at NVIDIA GTC DC.
It allows telecom providers to infuse AI into their mobile networks, starting with 5G advanced services and establishes the groundwork for 6G. The stack combines Cisco’s user plane function and 5G core software with the NVIDIA AI Aerial platform, creating a foundation that enables physical AI and integrated sensing with unmatched efficiency and security.
Cisco and NVIDIA’s collaboration continues to accelerate, driven by a shared vision of an AI-powered future that is scalable, observable, and secure. The advancements announced today are a testament to Cisco’s relentless pursuit of innovation that will accelerate AI adoption across enterprises, neoclouds and telecom providers.
“Cisco’s N9100 series, powered by NVIDIA Spectrum-X Ethernet switch silicon, provides a solution for high-performance, open infrastructure to meet our AI cloud demands. The capability to run NX-OS or SONiC under a unified operating model on Nexus Dashboard delivers more flexibility to our customers with operational simplicity. Its enterprise-grade networking with the scale and agility of the cloud — exactly what the next generation of AI workloads requires.” – Yih Leong Sun, Head of Infra, GMI Cloud
“As the demand for computing power continues to grow, our GPU clusters are expanding rapidly in scale. In ultra-large-scale GPU networks, we face various challenges such as congestion management and load balance. Cisco’s NCP compliant reference architecture with the N9100 Series switch provides us with the desired performance and openness out of the box. With the Cisco Nexus platform, we can fully leverage the AI networking capabilities of NVIDIA Spectrum-X Ethernet switch silicon without incurring additional operational or development costs and seamlessly integrate with our existing systems. We look forward to partnering with Cisco on this exciting journey ahead.” – Junfeng Cheng, Head of Networking Infrastructure, Xiaohongshu (RedNote)
”We believe its unified operating model with Nexus Dashboard and NCP-compliant reference architecture will simplify deployments and scale our AI infrastructure more efficiently. This solution is designed to accelerate innovation, reduce costs, and deliver large-scale capabilities to our customers faster than ever before.” – Wendy Wu, Chairman, Shanghai Lichan Technology Co., Ltd.
