There's an adage that states if you're not living on the edge, you're taking up too much space.  The same can be said for your network and datacenter infrastructure. Agile infrastructures that enable secure connectivity, flexibility, scalability and reliability, while delivering high-performance are imperative for dynamic business critical operations.

According to Gartner, by 2025, 85 percent of infrastructure strategies will integrate on-premises, colocation, cloud, and edge delivery options. Hybrid/multi-cloud architectures satisfy customers' demands for agility. Since many organizations need to maintain physical hardware resources for performance, security, or compliance reasons, they are turning to hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) to manage different types of workloads across physical and virtualized compute, storage, and network systems. This can raise the question, "Where is the best place to put it all?"

"We believe the network has to provide you with the ability not only to connect but to deal with the data at the edge."
-Chuck Robbins, CEO, Cisco Systems

Before answering that question, it's important to note that IT organizations are looking to optimize their data center footprint and reduce CapEx. Many organizations are migrating to colocation facilities, such as Equinix International Business Exchange^?(IBX^?) data centers. They also need to deliver application quality of service (QoS) to users and speed deployment of scalable, interconnected, digital infrastructure components, and connectivity options to business ecosystems at the edge.

This is why Equinix and Cisco have partnered to help enterprises deploy and interconnect Cisco HyperFlex? on Platform Equinix^?, where they can gain access to an essential HCI foundation and agile hybrid/multi-cloud services at the edge. I've spoken of Cisco SD-WAN deployment options through Equinix in a previous blog. Here, I'll focus on Cisco's Cloud Architecture at the Edge.

Cloud Architecture at the Edge

Cisco and Equinix help organizations optimize their data center investment. Cisco HyperFlex solutions help enterprises build, interconnect, and manage a common HCI to deploy applications from the core to the edge. The HCI software-centric architecture tightly integrates Cisco Unified Computing System? (Cisco UCS^?), software-defined storage, and virtual network devices into a single platform.

Moving Cisco HyperFlex from on-premises into Equinix IBX data centers answers the question of where the best place is for HCI hardware. Businesses on Platform Equinix are instantly gaining the scale, security, and sustainability of a trusted global leader, with up to 99.9999% average uptime record.

Cisco and Equinix simplify hybrid/multi-cloud deployment and management by running workloads securely and consistently across multiple public and private clouds. If needed, Cisco HyperFlex and Equinix Fabric enable on-premises databases and storage to sit adjacent to cloud platforms. These hybrid/multi-cloud architectures keep sensitive data safe and deliver low-latency performance, while leveraging cloud compute, storage, and application services, such as real-time analytics and artificial intelligence (AI). This provides greater flexibility and agility in enterprise workload distribution across on-premises and cloud environments, allowing for scalability to meet changing needs.

Global Transformation Alliance Partner Award

Cisco is excited and humbled to have been named Equinix's Global Transformation Alliance Partner Award winner this year. This award speaks to the strength of our partnership and the value it can deliver to our joint customers in accelerating their digital transformation journey.

We're just getting started! Learn more about what we're doing together to help customers transform their architecture to meet the demands of today's digital businesses.

Learn more about how together, Cisco and Equinix can help your business

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