Networking has been a relatively stable industry for decades. On the vendor side of the equation, it’s been Cisco vs. everyone else. On the tech side, a slow, steady progression of incrementally faster versions of tried-and-true standards like Wi-Fi and Ethernet. Then came ChatGPT, AI and generative AI to change everything. Here are the five hot networking trends for 2025, most of them driven by AI.
Acquisitions create three-way battle of the titans
The competitive landscape is experiencing upheaval that could lead to an AI-driven three-horse race for networking superiority among Cisco ($54 billion in annual revenue), HPE ($30 billion) and Broadcom ($51 billion).
Cisco closed its $28 billion acquisition of AI analytics leader Splunk last year and has been working hard to integrate product lines and deliver new offerings. Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins said the deal, the largest in Cisco’s history, will enable the company to “revolutionize the way our customers leverage data to connect and protect every aspect of their organization as we help power and protect the AI revolution.”
Shortly thereafter, HPE snapped up Juniper Networks. Once the $14 billion deal wends its way through the regulatory process, HPE intends to integrate AI functionality from Juniper across its broad portfolio of cloud and networking products and services.
HPE CEO Antonio Neri isn’t shy about poking the bear. “We are becoming a networking company at the core. Something that probably Cisco has forgotten now for a little bit,” Neri said in an interview with CRN. “And I think that’s the big opportunity, which ultimately is to give customers a more modern, AI-driven experience at the networking level.”
And then there’s Broadcom, which has traditionally been known as a chip maker, but has the potential to offer a full-stack solution to enterprise customers based on its hardware offerings (GPUs, network adapters, controllers and switches) and software from its acquisitions of CA, Symantec and VMware.
Broadcom recently reported that AI revenue grew 220%, driven by AI chips as well as Ethernet networking gear. The company is predicting that AI revenue will skyrocket from $12.2 billion in 2024 to more than $60 billion by 2027.
So, where does that leave Arista, Palo Alto, Extreme, Fortinet, Check Point and others? We might see some additional merger and acquisition activity in 2025.
AI spikes investments in high-performance networking gear
“The path to an AI revolution begins with a high-performance network,” says Dell’Oro Group analyst Sian Morgan. She says the hyperscalers have been leading the charge, while “enterprise investments in AI infrastructure are only just beginning. “
Morgan predicts that by 2027, the percentage of wireless access points shipped to enterprises with multi-gig ports will rise to over 60% of the total APs shipped, almost double the rate of 2022. The combined shipments of 2.5, 5 and 10 Gbps campus switch ports will grow by over 150% between 2022 and 2027, fueled by increasing traffic on the LAN and higher-capacity access points (AP).
Dell’Oro Group also predicts that in 2027, more than 25% of switch ports shipped to large enterprises will be 400 Gbps or higher, compared to 9% in 2022. The adoption of these higher speed interfaces will be driven by AI and high-performance compute (HPC) applications.
The latest market trend numbers from IDC confirm this trend. For example, in the second quarter of 2024, total market revenues for 200/400 GbE switches rose 104.3% annually and 35.7% sequentially, indicating strong interest in the highest-speed Ethernet switches used in datacenters, according to IDC.
“Ethernet switching is an important technology for enterprises, service providers, and cloud giants, as the cloud and AI eras continue to drive increasing demands on connectivity,” says IDC analyst Brandon Butler. “In the data center portion of the market, enterprises and service providers are building ever-faster Ethernet switch speeds to support rapidly expanding AI workloads.”
AIOps will transform enterprise networks
AI will generate new levels of network traffic, new requirements for low latency, and new layers of complexity. The saving grace, for network operators, is AIOps – the use of AI to optimize and automate network processes.
“The integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into IT operations (ITOps) is becoming indispensable,” says Forrester analyst Carlos Casanova. “AIOps provides real-time contextualization and insights across the IT estate, ensuring that network infrastructure operates at peak efficiency in serving business needs.”
He says that AIOps “is paving the way for the creation of autonomous networks that didn’t materialize during the era of software-defined networking or intent-based networking.”
AIOps can deliver proactive issue resolution, it plays a crucial role in embedding zero trust into networks by detecting and mitigating threats in real time, and it can help network execs reach the Holy Grail of “self-managing, self-healing networks that could adapt to changing conditions and demands with minimal human intervention.”
“AIOps is revolutionizing network management and turning networks into valuable business assets,” Casanova adds. “As digital businesses continue to evolve, the role of AIOps will only become more critical, ensuring that networks remain efficient, reliable, and aligned with business goals. Embracing AIOps is not just a technological upgrade; it’s a strategic imperative for any organization looking to thrive in the digital age.”
Ethernet edges out InfiniBand for high-bandwidth data center connectivity
Ethernet recently celebrated its 50th anniversary as the most widely deployed technology for enterprise network connectivity. The final frontier for Ethernet is deep in bowels of the data center, where its high-bandwidth, low-latency characteristics have made InfiniBand the preferred choice for high-performance computing systems.
But AI presents a market opportunity too attractive for the Ethernet vendors to pass up. Thus the creation of the Ultra Ethernet Consortium, led by Cisco, HPE, Arista and other familiar names, dedicated to supersizing Ethernet for AI workloads.
The consortium is now at around 55 member companies and Synopsis, Inc., just announced the industry’s first Ultra Ethernet IP solutions to meet the demand for standards-based, high-bandwidth, low-latency HPC and AI accelerator interconnects.
Industry veteran Zeus Kerravala predicts that 2025 will be the year that Ethernet becomes the protocol of choice for AI-based networking. “There is currently a holy war regarding InfiniBand versus Ethernet for networking for AI with InfiniBand having taken the early lead,” Kerravala says.
Ethernet has seen tremendous advancements over the last few years, and its performance is now on par with InfiniBand, he says, citing a recent test conducted by World Wide Technology. “In 2025, Ethernet sales will outpace InfiniBand for AI networking with Cisco and Arista being the big two,” predicts Kerravala.
The rise of single-vendor SASE
SASE, defined by Gartner as a service offering that includes SD-WAN plus zero-trust network access (ZTNA), secure web gateway (SWG), cloud access security broker (CASB), and network firewalling, requires vendors to combine multiple products into a single suite.
Because many of the early single-vendor SASE offerings were immature and lacked integration, multi-vendor SASE has been the most popular choice. But the tables are turning.
“Since we started tracking the SASE market in 2019, multi-vendor solutions have represented most of the market compared to single-vendor. However, we anticipate that single-vendor SASE will become the majority of the market,” says Dell’Oro Group analyst Mauricio Sanchez.
“As single-vendor SASE solution maturity increases, so is the comfort in purchasing it all from a single vendor. The pressure to go after best-of-breed from multiple vendors is slowly diminishing,” Sanchez says.
Single-vendor SASE solutions are expected to represent more than 85% of the market by 2028, driven by enterprise preference for integrated, one-stop solutions that simplify deployment and management, says Dell’Oro Group.
As enterprises shift toward single-vendor SASE, the market is consolidating around six SASE vendors who have a combined 72% of the total market. Those six vendors are Zscaler, Cisco, Palo Alto Networks, Broadcom, Fortinet, and Netskope, according to Dell’Oro.
Source:: Network World