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Cisco’s defining story in calendar 2025 was its push to become the secure infrastructure layer for enterprise artificial intelligence. That strategy showed up in more than product announcements: Cisco reported over $2 billion in fiscal-year AI infrastructure orders, expanded its NVIDIA relationship, made Splunk central to its security and observability plans, redesigned its partner program, changed senior leadership and cut jobs.
This ranking covers calendar year 2025. Cisco’s fiscal 2025 ended July 26, 2025, so financial figures below are labeled as fiscal-year results. Several other stories, including Cisco 360 and leadership changes, occurred during Cisco’s fiscal 2026.
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1. Cisco changed its channel leadership
In August, Cisco announced that channel chief Rodney Clark was leaving and that Tim Coogan would take over global partner sales. The move mattered because it came just as Cisco was preparing the most significant redesign of its partner program in decades.
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2. Cisco 360 rewrote the partner-program economics
At Partner Summit in November, Cisco disclosed more details about Cisco 360, scheduled to launch in January 2026 with the broader transition planned for early 2026. It was not simply a rebranding exercise.
The program introduced a Partner Value Index, a Cisco Partner Incentive, cross-sell bonuses, next-generation specialization bonuses and rewards tied to areas such as campus refreshes, AI, security, premium services, adoption and renewals. Cisco also organized its portfolio around networking, security, cloud and AI infrastructure, Splunk, collaboration and services.
The previous designation structure was to be replaced by “Cisco Partner” and “Cisco Preferred Partner” designations. The commercial question for partners was whether a smaller set of portfolios would genuinely simplify compensation—or replace one complicated incentive system with another. The model may favor firms able to sell across networking, security, services and Splunk, while creating challenges for specialists with narrower practices.
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Cisco’s announcement | CRN’s analysis
3. AI infrastructure orders exceeded $2 billion
Cisco began 2025 targeting more than $1 billion in AI infrastructure orders. By the end of fiscal 2025, it reported more than $2 billion in orders from web-scale customers, including more than $800 million in fiscal fourth-quarter orders.
The result was important because it supplied commercial evidence for Cisco’s AI-networking strategy. Cisco also reported fiscal 2025 revenue of $56.7 billion, up 5% year over year, and fourth-quarter revenue of $14.7 billion, up 8%.
Those figures require careful interpretation. Orders are commitments or bookings, not the same as recognized revenue, cash collected or profit. The AI figure primarily reflected web-scale customers and does not prove that ordinary enterprises were adopting AI infrastructure at the same pace. Cisco did not provide a separate AI-revenue line in the cited results.
Cisco fiscal 2025 earnings release
4. Cisco and NVIDIA built a Secure AI Factory
Cisco expanded its NVIDIA partnership in February and announced the Cisco Secure AI Factory with NVIDIA in March. The architecture combined Cisco Silicon One and Nexus networking, NVIDIA Spectrum-X networking, Cisco UCS systems using NVIDIA compute, Cisco Hypershield, Cisco AI Defense and NVIDIA AI Enterprise, along with storage and other ecosystem technologies.
In June, Cisco also described AI-ready data-center innovations involving Silicon One, Spectrum-X integration, AI PODs, AI Defense and Hypershield. Cisco joined the AI Infrastructure Partnership in May, an initiative that initially sought $30 billion and described potential total investment of up to $100 billion including debt.
The strategic shift was clear: Cisco was selling a validated architecture spanning networking, compute, security, observability and AI software rather than presenting switches as isolated products. That can simplify procurement and support for large customers, but it can also increase dependence on Cisco and NVIDIA road maps, reference designs, certifications and commercial terms. The announcements described architectures and plans; customers still need to confirm availability, supported configurations, hardware, GPU, optics, power and data-center requirements.
Expanded Cisco-NVIDIA partnership | Secure AI Factory | AI Infrastructure Partnership | AI-ready data centers
5. Cisco introduced AI Defense
On January 15, Cisco announced AI Defense, positioning it as protection for AI application development and use. The company described defenses against issues including misuse, data leakage and emerging AI-specific threats.
The announcement showed that Cisco wanted security to be a central part of its AI proposition rather than an accessory to networking. For customers, the practical question is where AI Defense operates in the lifecycle: development, deployment, runtime or governance. A buyer should also establish whether a capability is generally available, orderable, in preview, cloud-based or dependent on another Cisco product.
“AI security” is not a guarantee against every prompt-injection attack, model-abuse scenario, data leak or supply-chain threat. Those claims must be evaluated against the specific product, deployment point and threat model.
6. Splunk became central to Cisco’s AI strategy
Although Cisco completed its $28 billion Splunk acquisition in March 2024, 2025 was the year Cisco increasingly presented Splunk as the machine-data, observability and security foundation of its AI plans.
Cisco connected Splunk data and analytics more closely with its security and networking products, promoted observability for AI workloads and incorporated Splunk into its broader portfolio and Cisco 360 partner structure. The important question was no longer whether Cisco owned Splunk, but whether customers would receive a genuinely integrated operating model.
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Cisco fiscal 2025 summary report | Splunk newsroom archive
7. Cisco reshaped its senior leadership
Former Splunk CEO and Cisco president Gary Steele resigned effective April 25. Oliver Tuszik became executive vice president of global sales and chief sales officer. CFO Scott Herren announced his retirement, Mark Patterson was appointed CFO, and Jeetu Patel became president and chief product officer.
The changes aligned sales, product and finance leadership around Cisco’s AI and platform strategy. Steele’s later appointment as CEO of Shield AI made his departure more notable, given his role in the post-Splunk integration.
These moves should not automatically be treated as evidence of internal turmoil. Some were planned succession events or promotions. Their significance lies in how quickly Cisco was reorganizing leadership around AI, portfolio integration and route-to-market execution.
8. Cisco disclosed 221 Bay Area job cuts
August California WARN filings covered 157 positions in Milpitas and 64 in San Francisco, or 221 positions total. The cuts were expected to be completed by October 13.
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The filings illustrated the tension between Cisco’s AI-growth narrative and its effort to redirect resources toward new priorities. They also followed earlier workforce reductions and arrived amid portfolio and leadership changes.
The 221 positions were identified Bay Area filings, not a confirmed worldwide total for Cisco’s 2025 reductions. The filings also do not establish that AI directly caused every affected position to be eliminated. For employees and investors, the more defensible interpretation is resource reallocation and restructuring, with the precise business rationale varying by role.
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CRN’s report on the WARN filings
9. Cisco pursued three targeted acquisitions
Cisco announced or pursued three smaller deals during the second half of 2025:
- Aura Asset Intelligence: a Splunk app from Discovered Intelligence focused on asset and risk intelligence.
- NeuralFabric: an enterprise AI platform associated with data sovereignty and controlled AI deployment.
- EzDubs: an AI speech-to-speech translation company supporting 31 languages according to Cisco’s announcement coverage.
They addressed different gaps. Aura strengthened a Splunk-related capability; NeuralFabric supported Cisco’s enterprise AI and sovereignty ambitions; EzDubs was primarily a collaboration and language-technology play. Financial terms were not disclosed, and announced or intended acquisitions should not automatically be described as closed transactions without confirmation.
Cisco acquisition news | CRN’s acquisition summary
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.10. Cisco expanded its AI investment program
Cisco Investments continued backing the AI ecosystem, including investments involving Gruve.ai, Mistral AI, Fleak.ai and World Labs. This built on Cisco’s previously announced $1 billion global AI investment fund.
These investments were distinct from the $2 billion in AI infrastructure orders. Orders measure customer demand; venture investments show Cisco’s attempt to shape the startup ecosystem and gain exposure to emerging technologies. They may support future partnerships or products, but they do not guarantee revenue growth or investment returns.
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CRN’s account of Cisco’s AI investments
What these stories mean for customers, partners and investors
For customers
Cisco’s direction is increasingly a portfolio decision. An enterprise can evaluate networking, security, compute, AI Defense, Hypershield and Splunk separately; it does not necessarily need to buy the entire Secure AI Factory. The trade-off is between a potentially simpler validated stack and greater vendor concentration.
Large AI deployments should be evaluated for GPU compatibility, Ethernet fabric design, optics, power, storage, observability, security operations and internal skills. Customers should request a product-by-product availability and licensing map rather than relying on broad “AI platform” language.
For partners
Cisco 360 makes portfolio breadth and measurable customer outcomes more important. Partners should model incentives under the new Partner Value Index, examine how Splunk and services sales are credited, and determine whether specializations and renewals affect economics. The change may benefit broad integrators while making the transition harder for focused specialists.
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The strongest evidence of momentum was the more than $2 billion in AI infrastructure orders, but it was not an AI-revenue figure. The key follow-through questions are whether orders convert into recognized sales, whether enterprise demand broadens beyond web-scale customers, how Splunk affects recurring software growth, and whether restructuring improves profitability without damaging execution.
Bottom line
2025 was a meaningful transformation year for Cisco, not merely a sequence of AI-themed product announcements. The company tied networking to security, compute, observability and Splunk; reorganized its channel around cross-portfolio selling; and redirected capital and staffing toward AI.
But the transformation remained a work in progress. Its durability depends on converting orders into revenue and deployments, proving that Cisco 360 works for partners, simplifying Splunk integration and demonstrating that AI growth can coexist with disciplined execution.
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