Cisco Partner Summit is first and foremost an innovation showcase, according to Cisco’s new channel chief Tim Coogan. As such, the company revealed a handful of networking and security-focused platforms and capabilities for MSPs.
AI is moving faster than current networking infrastructures and security architectures can support. In fact, Cisco Systems expects AI to form the majority of its partners’ business in the next three to five years, which is why the tech giant is working to arm solution providers with the technology they need to prepare their customers now and help them scale easily in the future.
Cisco Partner Summit 2025, despite being the flagship annual partner event of the year, is first and foremost an innovation showcase, according to Cisco’s new channel chief Tim Coogan (pictured above). While partner program news and updates remain a big part of the show, Cisco doesn’t save all of its technology announcements for Cisco Live. To that end, the company this week revealed a handful of new networking and security-focused platforms and capabilities with an eye on making the job of an MSP a little easier.
From AI-powered platforms and innovations, to new networking gear, here’s what Cisco had to share this year at Partner Summit 2025.
Cisco Unified Edge
Cisco Unified Edge — “Not a server, but a platform,” according to Cisco, extends data center power and scale to the edge, to where real-time applications and AI inferencing data is generated, the company announced on Monday.
The platform, which is modular and cloud managed, integrates compute, networking, storage and security into a single system for businesses and channel partners to simplify AI workload management. It is supported by an extensive partner ecosystem that includes third-party vendors such as Nutanix, VMware, and Microsoft. The platform has been infused with Cisco Intersight, which allows Cisco to extend the same operational model used in the data center all the way to the edge, according to Jeremy Foster, senior vice president and general manager of Cisco Compute.
The Cisco Unified Edge platform is orderable now and will be shipping in December, Foster said.
Cisco IQ
Bringing the power of AI into Cisco support and professional services, Cisco IQ, revealed on Tuesday, is a brand-new digital interface for customers and partners.
Cisco IQ brings real-time insights, on-demand assessments, troubleshooting and personalized learning, automation and agents from across professional services and support together in a single interface. The offering will help customers plan, deploy, manage, secure and optimize technology investments with greater speed and simplicity while adapting to their unique environments, Cisco said.
Cisco IQ comes in flexible deployment options, including SaaS, on-prem tethered, or on-prem air-gapped. The offering is expected to be available in the second half of Cisco’s fiscal 2026, which begins in February.
Security Cloud Control for MSPs
Cisco wants to simplify security for MSPs while growing its next-generation, mesh firewall deployments, the company said.
As such, Cisco on Monday introduced multi-customer management capabilities within Cisco Security Cloud Control platform that’s been purposely designed with MSPs in mind. Cisco Security Cloud Control brings centralized security management and real-time insights in combination with AI-powered protection for businesses. Now geared toward the MSP, Security Cloud Control for MSPs will help streamline operations, reduce costs, and accelerate managed security service practices for partners, Cisco said. The platform will also help MSPs accelerate adoption of hybrid mesh firewalls and bundle multiple security tools, the company said.
Security Cloud Control for MSPs is expected to be generally available in February.
Global Overview For Unified Meraki, Catalyst Visibility
Cisco previously announced that it was bringing Meraki and Catalyst together into one unified view back in 2022 when the company revealed that the Cisco Catalyst portfolio could be managed via the popular and simpler cloud-based Meraki dashboard, a long-time request from both customers and partners. At Cisco Partner Summit 2025, the company revealed a new Global Overview feature that will provide direct visibility and access to a customers’ entire network, no matter where it’s deployed, for a single cloud dashboard experience.
The company said the innovation will “radically” simplify network management across campus and branch, cloud-based and on-premises for channel partners, who will have comprehensive access to every site across the network. Now in beta, Global Overview will be generally available in Q4, 2025.
Available now however, are workflows spanning Meraki, Catalyst Center, Catalyst SD-WAN Manager, ISE, Nexus and more can be automated and orchestrated with AI Assistant, including once manual tasks such as switch migration, Wi-Fi setup, and device onboarding, Cisco said.
New Networking Routers, Wi-Fi 7 APs
On the networking and wireless connectivity front, Cisco used its annual partner event to introduce its latest routers and access points, which the company said will empower distributed organizations and prepare such businesses to handle more AI workloads.
Cisco is adding to its secure 8000 router series with two new offerings: the 8200 and 8400 Series Secure Routers that will pair high-performance routing, a built-in firewall and ultra-low latency for medium to large campus deployments for seamless and automated connectivity.
The new Wi-Fi 7 access points—the CW9171I and CW9174—along with the new CW9800L Wireless Controller are designed for low- and medium-density deployments and offer high throughput, low latency, and intelligent management for seamless scale. New wireless assurance capabilities include Roaming Health and the upcoming Cisco ThousandEyes Active Testing for Wireless APs for increased visibility, faster troubleshooting, and optimized performance.
Cisco said both the new 8000 series routers and Wi-Fi 7 APs will be orderable in Q4 2025.
