Cisco is on track to surpass $1 billion worth of AI infrastructure orders in 2025, the tech giant announced during its Q2 2025 earnings call on Wednesday evening. Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins also thanked former Splunk CEO and Cisco’s current president of go-to-market, Gary Steele, who is departing in April to pursue a CEO position elsewhere.
Cisco Systems’ second fiscal quarter of 2025 saw a surge in deals requiring network upgrades for incoming AI applications, CEO Chuck Robbins said during the tech giant’s Q2 2025 earnings call on Wednesday.
Cisco reported AI infrastructure orders of more than $350 million during its second quarter, bringing the total for the first half of Cisco’s fiscal 2025 to approximately $700 million. The company is on track to surpass $1 billion of AI infrastructure orders in 2025, Robbins said.
“AI security is top of mind for customers, especially in light of the emergence of new AI models. These have reinforced that the battle for AI leadership will be on a global playing field… The adoption of AI network infrastructure, data capacity investments, and best-in-class AI security are all tailwinds for Cisco,” Robbins said.
While AI traction has mainly been driven by hyperscale cloud buildouts, enterprise opportunity is on the rise as businesses plan to bolster their infrastructure for the AI era, Robbins said.
[Related: Cisco Agile Services Networking: What Partners Should Know]
Robbins highlighted momentum in Hypershield, the company’s AI-powered security architecture for data center protection. Cisco booked two eight-figure deals during the second fiscal quarter of 2025, which the company said signaled commitment from large customers for a “transformative” approach to security.
Cisco’s data center switching portfolio had its fourth consecutive quarter of double-digit order growth as enterprises ready themselves for AI deployments, Robbins said.
The company’s product revenues, which is led by the core networking business, increased 11 percent excluding Splunk and service revenues climbed 6 percent during Q2 2025. Including Spunk,
the company saw its fourth consecutive quarter of accelerating growth in product orders with 29 percent growth year over year.
“This is a testament to our power of our portfolio and value we bring to customers,” Robbins said.
Robbins also took to the call to share that Gary Steele, Cisco’s president of go-to-market, will resign as of April 25 to pursue a CEO position elsewhere.
Cisco Q2 2025 Financial Results
Cisco’s networking segment includes the core switching and routing businesses, as well as the company’s telecommunications, cloud, and optical networking products. Networking, a typically strong category for Cisco, declined 3 percent with revenues of $6.85 billion compared to Q2 2024’s result. The segment was impacted primarily by declines in server sales, said Cisco CFO R. Scott Herren.
Cisco’s security segment rose a whopping 117 percent year over year with revenues of $2.11 billion, which was attributed to the company’s offerings such as zero trust and extended detection and response (XDR) and Secure Access, Robbins said.
The observability segment continued its strong momentum, posting 47 percent revenue growth quarter over quarter of $277 million.
Excluding Splunk, the security and observability segments grew 4 percent and 3 percent, respectively, in the second quarter of fiscal 2025, according to the company.
Cisco’s collaboration segment increased 1 percent year over year to $996 million in revenue compared to Q2 2024, driven by strength in contact center and CPaaS, Herren said.
Subscriptions now make up about 56 percent of Cisco’s total revenue, which grew 23 percent year over year, Robbins said.
For Cisco’s fiscal Q2 2025, which ended January 25, revenue was up 9 percent to $13.99 billion compared to the same period a year ago. Cisco posted non-GAAP earnings per share of 94 cents, an 8 percent increase compared to a year ago and non-GAAP net income of $3.8 billion in the second fiscal quarter of the year, which was up 6 percent year over year.
In the first quarter of fiscal 2025, Cisco closed the acquisition of Deeper Insights AI Ltd., a privately held AI services company.
Cisco’s stock was up nearly 7 percent in after-hours trading Wednesday following the networking giant’s earnings release.
