In the AI era, performance is measured in time: time to first token, time to remediation, and ultimately, time to value. Time is the new currency, but AI only moves as fast as the network it runs on.

So, the question becomes: Is your network accelerating AI, or quietly holding it back? AI workloads are fundamentally different from traditional applications in three ways. First, they are massive data engines. They generate and consume traffic at an intensity that pushes even advanced 800G infrastructure to its limits. Second, they’re power intensive. Data center power consumption is expected to double by 2026 because of AI, demanding infrastructure that delivers more performance per watt. And lastly, they’re highly sensitive to network conditions. Even a moment of latency, congestion, or jitter—often insignificant for traditional applications—can slow or halt AI training jobs, leaving expensive accelerated compute waiting instead of producing outcomes.

That’s why AI networking must deliver both scale and simplicity. Scale keeps data flowing, so GPUs stay productive, and jobs complete faster. Simplicity ensures these complex environments can be operated reliably, with issues identified and resolved quickly before performance degrades.

Today, Cisco is launching a new wave of innovation designed to scale out and scale across for the agentic era. This includes the introduction of the Silicon One G300 ASIC, 102.4T systems, 1.6T optics, P200-powered systems, AgenticOps for data center networking, and Cisco Nexus One.

Cisco Nexus One: Meeting customers where they are in their AI journey

Most organizations are not building AI infrastructure from scratch. They’re working across existing environments—traditional IT, cloud, edge, and AI—often spanning multiple geographies, regulatory regimes, and sovereign domains. The goal: deploy AI workloads without disrupting business. However, ambitions to accelerate AI adoption come with mounting complexity, from siloed infrastructure and operational sprawl to new security threats across the AI lifecycle.

This is where Cisco Nexus One comes in. Designed to adapt to customers’ unique needs and stages of AI transformation, Nexus One provides flexibility and interoperability across the stack, while maintaining operational consistency across the network.

This comprehensive foundation spans silicon, systems, optics, software, and operating models—with recent advancements driven by significant investments at every layer.

Scale-out networking: Nexus infrastructure powered by Silicon One G300

At the heart of Nexus One is Cisco’s highly programmable Silicon One ASIC, purpose-built for AI. Designed to evolve with shifting AI workloads and dynamic environments, it supports a wide range of network roles and use cases.

With the introduction of Cisco Silicon One G300—the industry’s most advanced 102.4 Tbps scale-out switching ASIC—we enable distributed AI workloads and backend fabrics for massive clusters, unlocking new levels of intelligence.

AI traffic often overwhelms traditional switches with synchronized microbursts, but the G300’s industry-leading fully shared packet buffer handles surges without packet loss, delivering up to 2.5x increased burst absorption. Furthermore, simulations show a 28% reduction in job completion time (JCT) with intelligent load balancing, significantly increasing AI compute efficiency.

These gains increase as AI environments scale, delivering greater benefits with larger models, bigger clusters, and more network tiers where collective communication dominates. The business impact is straightforward: faster training means higher GPU utilization, quicker model convergence, and lower operational costs.

The G300 powers new Cisco N9364F-SG3 switches, offering 64 ports of 1.6T OSFP connectivity in a compact form factor, delivering breakthrough performance for high-density AI clusters in both 100% liquid-cooled and air-cooled deployments.

Cisco Silicon One G300–powered Cisco N9364F-SG3 (102.4T) switch with 1.6T OSFP optics for massive AI clusters
Scaling AI with power-efficient infrastructure

As data center power demands grow, efficient infrastructure becomes essential for sustainable AI scaling.

Our new high-radix 102.4T liquid-cooled system reduces overall power consumption and delivers 70% greater efficiency than today’s equivalent bandwidth solution with six 51.2T air-cooled systems.

These advancements minimize energy use, reduce cooling requirements, and extend component lifespan, enabling more cost-effective and sustainable AI data centers.

Cisco N9364F-SG3 (102.4T) 100% liquid-cooled switch
Scale-across networking: Nexus infrastructure powered by Silicon One P200

Building on our October 2025 Silicon One P200 announcement, we’re bringing scale-across capabilities to Cisco Nexus One with the Cisco N9364E-SP2R fixed switches and N9836E-SP2R modular line card. The fixed systems, powered by the P200 ASIC, feature 64 ports of 800G OSFP or QSFP-DD with quantum safe line-rate encryption and industry-leading deep buffers—optimized for universal spine use cases in distributed and multi-cloud environments. The line card, featuring 36 ports of 800G OSFP, integrates seamlessly with the N9800 modular switches to deliver scalable growth based on customer needs.

This architecture enables organizations to deploy AI workloads across geographic regions, sovereign clouds, or multiple data center sites while maintaining the performance characteristics of a single, unified infrastructure.

Breaking the power wall: 800G OSFP Linear Pluggable Optics

As part of our ongoing commitment to delivering exceptional cost benefits and sustainable innovation, we’re introducing Cisco OSFP 800G Linear Pluggable Optics (LPO) with the Cisco N9364E-SG2X powered by Silicon One G200 series. By integrating signal processing into the Silicon One ASIC, LPO reduces per-module power consumption by 50% and lowers overall system power by 30%. With this breakthrough innovation, organizations can scale AI infrastructure efficiently and meet energy-efficiency targets.

Next-level simplicity: Unified operating model for smarter AI networks

Managing today’s AI networks shouldn’t be complicated. That’s why Cisco’s flexible operating model delivers a seamless, consistent experience—no matter where your workloads live.

We are excited to announce additional enhancements to our Nexus One portfolio:

Uniform networking and deep visibility: Nexus One provides consistent networking across on-premises, sovereign cloud, underlay, overlay, and Kubernetes environments. With Cisco Isovalent, you also gain deep visibility into service IPs and traffic patterns, eliminating operational blind spots.
Simplified orchestration and management: Scaling your AI fabric is simpler than ever. Cisco N9000 systems now support cloud management via Nexus Hyperfabric, enabling easy orchestration and scaling across multiple locations with built-in multi-site orchestration.
Flexibility at the core: Run Cisco NX-OS, ACI, or now SONiC—all on the same Cisco N9000 systems. Protect your investments and choose the operational approach that fits your business best, with no compromises.
Security built in: Integrated hardware root of trust on every system port and quantum threat-resilient line-rate encryption are foundational. With the new Cisco Live Protect enforcement mode, organizations can automatically deploy kernel-level mitigations in real time, addressing vulnerabilities and zero-day exploits without maintenance windows or downtime.
Integrated operations and analytics: With new native Splunk integration in on-premises Nexus Dashboard, you get unified analytics and federated search across network telemetry and the Nexus Dashboard Data Lake—no data duplication required. This helps maintain data sovereignty, cut operational costs, and speed up mean time to remediation (MTTR).

But operational simplicity is only the beginning. Cisco is pioneering new innovations for intelligent, autonomous network operations.

Agentic era’s new frontier: AI Canvas brings AgenticOps to life

Traditional network operations models can’t keep pace with the scale and complexity of managing AI infrastructure. That’s why we’re introducing AgenticOps for data center networking through AI Canvas—giving teams the ability to troubleshoot, gain insights, configure, and optimize enterprise infrastructure, including AI fabrics, through guided, human-in-the-loop conversations.

Powered by the Cisco Deep Network Model—built on over 40 years of networking expertise and unified network and security telemetry—the model delivers 20% more accurate reasoning than general-purpose LLMs for networking tasks.

Maximize AI infrastructure investments

At the end of the day, scaling AI isn’t just about networking—it’s about moving faster, innovating boldly, and realizing the full value of your AI investments.

With Silicon One G300 and P200 powering Cisco Nexus One, and AgenticOps making operations smarter, we’re building the foundation to help organizations get the most out of their AI investments.

By unifying silicon, systems, and intelligent operations with integrated security and a consistent operational experience, we’re helping customers improve GPU utilization and accelerate their AI journeys.

Additional resources:

Related blogs: