Cisco brings enterprise AI infrastructure to the edge: CUBEd Award winner
Artificial intelligence is changing the technology equation in numerous ways, including how enterprises approach edge computing.
Much of today’s edge infrastructure was not built to support AI workloads. Cisco Systems Inc. is seeking to close that gap with Unified Edge, which earned the company the 2026 Tech Innovation CUBEd Award for the most innovative IoT or edge platform. The solution is designed to address the growing infrastructure demands created by AI workloads outside the data center.
“As we moved from enterprise workloads to generative AI workloads, the infrastructure was stressed to begin with,” said James Leach (pictured, right), director of product management at Cisco. “Now we’re seeing generative AI really moving towards agentic AI. I think of it as almost like a multiplier effect on my workforce. How would I deal with 10x as many employees in the field and be able to provide them the infrastructure they need? That’s the kind of problem our customers are facing now with AI creeping towards the data, towards the edge in a way that is really unprecedented.”
Leach spoke with theCUBE’s Dave Vellante during an exclusive conversation on theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s livestreaming studio. They discussed how Cisco is bringing enterprise-grade computing, centralized management and a broader partner ecosystem to AI deployments at the edge.
