Cisco hedges bets on enterprise cloud and 5G technology

The power of alliances, both with the big boys in the businesses such as Google and Tata Consultancy Services and with a range of startups, was the primary focus area at the latest edition of the Cisco India Summit held in Kochi recently. These are some of the primary areas that the global technology behemoth said it is focussing on, in the coming year.

Enterprise cloud centres

Indian tech behemoth Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) said that in collaboration with Cisco, they will be setting up enterprise cloud centres in the country.

According to TCS, this will help offer customised cloud solutions for enterprises in the country.

Talking about the plans, Venkat Babu, head of solutions for enterprise cloud platforms, TCS said, “We are offering this in collaboration with Cisco. We have more than 13 similar data centres across the world and plan to bring it to India soon. We currently have a platform as a service offering, iON for SMBs. We want to offer multi-cloud operations so that enterprises don’t have to choose between the private and public cloud. We will also be offering services to help customers better manage data.”

The rise of 5G

5G has been the major technology talk point over the past couple of years and is a key area, especially considering the multitude of use cases it is bound to bring about, ranging from autonomous driving to making communications more easier. In this space, Cisco said that it was emerging as a major player in the 5G mobile connectivity space and taking a lead in the latest sixth-generation wireless standard, Wi-Fi 6.

Talking about the innovation in the field, Sandeep Arora, MD, CX India pointed out, “Advances in networking architecture, especially via 5G and Wi-Fi 6 wireless network standards will ensure improvement in speed, performance and capacity that will help remove bottlenecks for enterprises.”

The company also spoke of the network blocks in certain areas covered by 4G networks in the country and the need to upgrade the Wi-Fi networks to reduce redundancies.

VC Gopalratnam, SVP-IT and Chief Information Officer-International, Cisco said, “Data consumption will emerge as a gamechanger as India emerges as a major data consumer. Wi-Fi 6 and 5G will be the future of the telecom networks in the world.”

The company has said that Cisco has 100 engagements based on 5G globally, with multiple trails being held as well.

Anand Bhaskar, Managing Director, Service Providers Sales, Cisco India and SAARC said, “5G will have a critical role to play in making India a $5 trillion economy in the next five years. Organisations can enable digital transformation and offer a better customer experience with wireless technologies like 5G and Wi-Fi 6.”

Software drives new models

In an increasingly connected world, the software is fast becoming vital to all aspects of our lives. Cisco says that software is at the forefront of their strategy.

“Creating a new business model, finding the right partners and getting the last mile connectivity are key pillars of success for businesses in this world, which is increasingly getting digitised,” Sameer Garde, President, Cisco India and SAARC said.

Multi-clouds to enterprise

Cisco spoke about its multi-cloud strategy, including the hybrid-cloud alliance with Google and Kubernetes for Amazon Web Services (AWS).

Explaining the manner in which Cisco is creating tech for consumers, Anand Patil, Director, Systems Engineering says, “A multi-cloud strategy can help organisations avoid vendor lock-in, lower the risk of DDoS attacks, and improve reliability. Multi-cloud allows organisations to shift to the cloud at their own pace and take a flexible approach.”