The annual Cisco Live 2024, to be held June 2-6 in Las Vegas, will boast Elton John as the music artist performing at the Wednesday night celebration event, as well as seven-time Super Bowl champion Tom Brady and Formula 1 driver Oscar Piastri as special guests. However, while those names create exciting entertainment, the more than 20,000 attendees are there to learn the latest and greatest in Cisco Systems Inc. technology and innovation.
Juniper Networks Inc. announced enhancements this week to its AI-Native Networking Platform, aimed at adding value to its cloud-hosted products. These products use Mist AI to optimize user experiences and simplify operations, as well as network assistant Marvis. The new features detect and fix network, application and security issues, which enables customers to anticipate user needs. The company says this approach can lower operational costs by up to 85%.
The day after Cisco Systems Inc. announced its third-quarter 2024 earnings, investors are wavering on the results, as the stock was falling 2% this morning, reversing a 5% jump after-hours Monday. The company reported revenue of $12.7 billion, down 13% year-over-year — 16% without Splunk — and $70 million ahead of consensus estimates. Gross margins remain best-in-class for an infrastructure vendor at 68.3%.
Extreme Networks Inc. recently held its annual user conference, Connect, in Fort Worth, Texas, where everything is big. In keeping with that tradition, Extreme had its own big news from the show. Day 1 news involved Extreme being approved for standard power for the 6-gigahertz spectrum for Wi-Fi. This new band was added to Wi-Fi 6E and 7, providing clean spectrum and speeds north of 1 gigabits per second.
With Zscaler Inc.‘s announced acquisition today of startup Airgap Networks Inc., a network access and segmentation tech provider, the cybersecurity provider is looking to address gaps in operational technology. No financial terms for the purchase were provided, but Airgap has raised a little over $13 million since it was founded in 2019, so the deal is likely under $100 million. Recently, I spoke with Naresh Kumar (pictured), vice president and general manager of product management at Zscaler, to review the acquisition details. He put the deal in perspective.