This year’s Cisco Live! in Las Vegas, NV brought together networking enthusiasts from around the world, emphasizing the theme of observability and highlighting the importance of visibility and network and application monitoring in modern network infrastructures. Moreover, the prominence of multi-cloud strategies encompassing AWS and Azure, along with the critical issue of SD-WAN operations, has taken center stage for enterprise teams.

While the event is undoubtedly a showcase of cutting-edge technology, it is the people that create a special environment, with familiar faces and strong relationships creating a vibrant atmosphere for many repeat attendees to the show even as  many new faces joining the Cisco Live! community.

Fun fact from David Izumo, Principal Engineer at LiveAction

Before it was known as Cisco Live! the event was called Networkers, a testament to its long-standing history in the networking world. During the course of his career, David has attended 15 Cisco Live! events in North America, seven in EMEA, and one in Melbourne. We asked David his thoughts on the show this year.

  • The People Factor
    Over the years, Cisco Live! has evolved tremendously, adapting to the changing landscape of networking technology and the needs of networking professionals. What sets Cisco Live! apart is not just its focus on networking advancements, but also its dedication to fostering meaningful connections among attendees.
  • Observability Was More Prominent This Year Than in Previous Years.
    Observability, which encompasses monitoring, tracing, and logging, plays a pivotal role in ensuring network performance, identifying issues promptly and enabling effective troubleshooting. By emphasizing observability, Cisco Live! encourages attendees to explore and implement the latest tools and techniques to gain comprehensive visibility into their network infrastructure.
  • Multi-Cloud Connectivity Took Center Stage
    As enterprises increasingly adopt multi-cloud strategies, the connectivity between cloud and on-premises environments becomes paramount. Cisco Live! dedicated ample attention to addressing the challenges and opportunities this emerging trend presents. With a focus on AWS and Azure, attendees had the opportunity to explore best practices, learn from industry experts, and discover innovative solutions to seamlessly integrate their multi-cloud environments.
  • The SD-WAN Revolution
    The ever-growing importance of Software-Defined Wide Area Networking (SD-WAN) cannot be overstated. As such, it remains a hot button issue for enterprise teams attending Cisco Live! 2023, and will remain a focus of enterprises for years to come.
  • Multi-Domain Visibility
    In addition to LAN, WAN, and data center technologies, we also saw the significance of multi-domain policies and visibility. As the complexities of managing network intent across diverse domains grow, ensuring consistent policies and gaining holistic visibility into network infrastructure is a key priority for network teams to streamline network operations and enhance overall network performance.

With its renewed focus on observability, multi-cloud connectivity, and the pressing issues of SD-WAN, this year’s event served as a hub for networking professionals seeking the latest advancements and insights. However, it is the people, the relationships, and the sense of community that truly made Cisco Live! a standout experience. As attendees recover from the confines of the pandemic, there is a palpable burst of energy, making this year’s event even more engaging and exciting.

LiveAction was proud to sponsor Cisco Live! 2023, and spent the week in Las Vegas showcasing it’s network intelligence solutions – the LiveNX network performance management platform and LiveWire packet analysis solution. Hundreds of attendees were able to experience the power, speed, and ease-of-use of the industry’s best solution for monitoring, managing, and troubleshooting Cisco networks (or any multi-vendor networks) through in-booth demos or our presentations from John Smith, founder and CTO of LiveAction, and David Izumo.

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