AMSTERDAM - Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: NASDAQ:CSCO) and NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ: NASDAQ:NVDA) announced a collaboration today to provide enterprises with advanced artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure solutions. The partnership aims to simplify the deployment and management of AI technologies for data centers, capitalizing on Cisco's Ethernet networking expertise and NVIDIA's leadership in GPU innovation.
The announcement, made at Cisco Live EMEA, underscores the companies' shared vision of assisting enterprises in navigating the AI transition with secure Ethernet-based infrastructure. The collaboration has already secured European cloud services provider ClusterPower as a key customer, looking to bolster its data center operations with these AI/ML solutions.
Cisco's M7 generation of Unified Computing System (UCS) rack and blade servers now include NVIDIA's latest Tensor Core GPUs, optimizing performance for a variety of AI and data-intensive tasks in data centers and at the edge. Additionally, NVIDIA AI Enterprise software, which supports the development and deployment of AI workloads, is now listed on Cisco's global price list.
To facilitate the deployment of AI clusters, Cisco Validated Designs (CVDs) offer jointly validated reference architectures. These CVDs provide a straightforward approach to managing AI clusters at any scale and will be available later this month for FlexPod and FlashStack for Generative AI Inferencing with NVIDIA AI Enterprise, with more to follow.
Cisco is enhancing AI infrastructure management through its Networking Cloud, using tools like Cisco Nexus Dashboard and Cisco Intersight for both on-premises and cloud-based operations. ThousandEyes, a Cisco company, provides Digital Experience Monitoring to deliver AI-driven insights and automated problem remediation across cloud and on-premises networks. The Cisco Observability Platform leverages AI to correlate telemetry across domains, improving visibility and digital experiences.
Cisco's global ecosystem of partners, such as World Wide Technology (WWT), is ready to support organizations in adopting these AI and automation solutions. The partnership is poised to accelerate the delivery of Ethernet-based AI solutions to clients, with WWT's AI Proving Ground lab already incorporating Cisco and NVIDIA technologies.
Vijay Bhagavath, Vice President at IDC Research, highlighted the importance of understanding AI workloads' demands on data center infrastructure. He commended the Cisco and NVIDIA partnership for combining trusted brands and complementary technologies to help customers harness AI's potential with performance-optimized Ethernet-based infrastructure.
The new solutions will be available through Cisco Channel partners in the second quarter of the calendar year. This initiative is based on a press release statement from Cisco Systems, Inc.
InvestingPro Insights
As Cisco Systems, Inc. (CSCO) embarks on its collaboration with NVIDIA to revolutionize AI infrastructure, investors and stakeholders might be interested in the company's robust financial health and market position. Cisco boasts a perfect Piotroski Score of 9, indicating a strong financial position. This is particularly pertinent given the company's strategic moves to enhance AI infrastructure management—a venture that could be resource-intensive. Furthermore, Cisco's practice of holding more cash than debt on its balance sheet provides a cushion that could support ambitious projects like the one with NVIDIA. The company's financial resilience is also reflected in its high shareholder yield and the fact that it has raised its dividend for 13 consecutive years, reassuring investors of its commitment to shareholder returns.
Looking at the company's performance, Cisco's market capitalization stands at an impressive $201.18 billion, with a P/E ratio of 14.86, which adjusts to an even more attractive 14.12 when considering the last twelve months as of Q1 2024. This is complemented by a solid revenue growth of nearly 11% over the same period. These metrics, coupled with a dividend yield of 3.15%, make a compelling case for the company's financial stability and growth potential.
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