>>Mm. Every CEO is trying to get hybrid, right? Most people, they've been working remotely for the better part of two years now, and we've spent a lot of time and thought on how to accommodate remote workers and providing tools to make them feel connected and more productive. We've also built remote and hybrid models into our hiring ethos, making it a feature, not a drawback. But what about the underlying infrastructure that powers hybrid work? How is that evolving to be as flexible, scalable and cost effective with the lowest latency possible? Recent survey data from Enterprise Technology Research shows that 56% of executives believe productivity continues to improve, with only 14% citing recent declines in productivity. 26% say it's holding steady. The question is, how do we maintain those positives and minimise the negatives? And what role does the network and underlying infrastructure play in evolving new work models? Welcome to the network powering hybrid work on the Cube, made possible by Cisco. My name is Dave Volonte, and I'll be your host today. In this programme, you're gonna hear from experts that are going to discuss and introduce new innovations that are specifically designed to energise and support hybrid work. My first guest is Lawrence Wang, who's the vice president of product management at Cisco. And we're going to dig into WiFi six e and what it all means to the future of work. Lawrence, welcome. Good to see you. >>Hey, great to be here. Dave. Thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here today. >>You bet. Okay. My first big question is what's the big rush? It feels like we were just talking about the shift from y 55 to WiFi six just a few years ago. What's going on there? >>Yeah. I mean, you're right, right. We assets at Cisco. We introduced our first WiFi six access points back in 2019, and one of the things that we've seen is a tremendous rate of adoption moving from WiFi five to WiFi six over the past couple of years. In fact, it's one of our fastest transitions that we've seen between wireless standards. And a lot of the drivers, you know, for that were really just about, you know, making sure that there's better WiFi experiences for, you know, people in the office making sure that they can support. You know more of that. Have you got a set of clients? Reduce the amount of congestion. And over time, what we've seen is that migration has been tremendous. But it also means that we're starting to reach that capacity where five gigahertz is starting to become more crowded and so many of our customers are looking at. Well, what can I actually do to continue to expand? You know that you know that traffic, the number of lanes that I can actually support for wireless traffic And for many of them, they're looking to WiFi succeed as the answer to help them do that simply because six gigahertz as part of that standard introduces a whole new spectrum or a whole new highway that we can get client devices as long as >>well, So it sounds like you're thinking about a different role for offices and campuses going forward. So what your listeners expect to see kind of in the in the near term and the midterm and even a long term near term when they get back into the office and in the long term, how do you see this playing out? >>Yeah, that's an interesting question, right When you think about this context of hybrid work, work is not a place that you go to, but it's really a place that you could be where ultimately you are trying to get work done. It really is reporting that quality of experience, no matter where you choose to work from. And, yes, while the campus is going to evolve and play a different role, it is a critical part of that hybrid work future. And the way I see it here is that the role of the campus is going to change over time. It's not going to be the same that we saw prior to two years ago, and I think for many of our customers about what does it mean to invest in that infrastructure for us to continue to adapt, to support the ways that their employees that are expected or want to work? And a big part of that is investing in infrastructure to support new ways of working? >>Well, you know, Lawrence, I mean, I've personally been lucky because we go to studio and I've been able to come into the office since the pandemic started, but I know a lot of people. They're really excited to get back, to work in person and face to face events and the like. And I know others that say, You know what? I'm moving and I'm always gonna work remotely. I'll never work for another company that forces me to go in the office again. So this sounds like a tall order for it organisations to accommodate that diversity. How do you think they will be able to plan for and manage all this new complexity? >>Yeah. I mean, I think the reality is, you know, talent. It doesn't know any zip codes, right? And I think one of the boons of being able to support a more distributed workforce is to be able to bring in great talent no matter where they're based out of. And I think for I t team. So I think the interesting thing will be what are the drivers to bring people back into the office right? There has to be a purpose that's more meaningful than simply It's a place that I go to every single day. You know, what are the tools and applications I bring in to help support collaboration, And I think important part of making this a great experience in the context of hybrid work is that you do have to make the office a meaningful place for employees to gather, but also making sure that as you connect people around the world as part of the global employee workforce that they still have an equitable experience. So for it teams, it is about thinking about how do I actually manage this infrastructure that's more distributed? But I start to invest in my central campuses and at the same time making sure that I have great quality experiences for everyone. Unified security policies, visibility across all the clients and applications. But there's also increasing pressure from their its core constituency. We know that people are asking more of it. They want them to support you, use cases like safe return office that they want to help you contributor to global corporate initiatives like driving towards zero greenhouse gas emissions. So any number of these activities or initiatives is putting more pressure on teams. >>Interesting. I mean, so I gotta ask you, please don't hate me for this question. But was this just luck on Cisco's part that you got solutions ready for this sort of hybrid work model so quickly. In other words, was it something that you were maybe planning that was going to take years for the market to be ready for And it just got compressed because of the pandemic? Or was this architecture that allows you to be flexible? How did you land here and what appears to be a pretty strong position? >>Yeah, I mean, at Cisco, I think one of the things that we think about is, you know, it's always amazing when you look back at something and then you write the story. But I think if we're being honest with ourselves, if you look at what happened from where we were two years ago to where we are today, including our competitors and customers, I think that no one could have predicted the world that we're operating and living in. And so for us, the question becomes, How did we help our customers support this transition? And ultimately it's about investing in architectures and platforms that are flexible, that allows our customers support use cases that they were thinking of, as well as ones that they never anticipated, and I think that's really the exciting thing about what we've been doing here as part of our hybrid work investments now areas that, you know, I think we double down on and in some ways accelerated because of this. When I think about you know what our customers care about when they start bringing people back into the office. It is about some of these emerging use cases, whether it's more dynamic, way finding, be able to understand the density or the air quality of a given environment. And these are some of the technologies that we have embedded in some of our new, you know, WiFi 60 access points along with our management infrastructure era. So I think that it gives our customers and partners a lot more flexibility than what they had before to really adapt to the changing needs of today and even beyond. >>Well, that's something we've certainly learned throughout the pandemic. Is the ability to be flexible is fundamental? I gotta ask you, what's your preferred mode of work? You go back into the office, you're gonna stay remote. >>Great question. You know, I have come to appreciate, you know, working from home. You know, over the past couple years, got to spend a little more time with my kids at lunch. But I will say I am looking forward to the day when I can have the voice of being back in the office a few days a week as well as I continue to be remote as well as continued to visit my customers and partners all over this great country in the world. So looking forward to that, >>so you're a true hybrid. I guess I'm a hybrid, too. I like being in the office, but I'm travelling a lot when the world returns to the new abnormal anyway. Large. Thanks so much for kicking off the programme with me. Now in a minute, we're going to dig into the core of the network and understand the role it plays in supporting new and flexible work models. You're watching the network powering hybrid work made possible by Cisco on the Cube, your leader in global enterprise tech coverage. Mhm. Yeah,

good thumbnail for your video all right thank you all for the patience we are now ready to start filming did you want to take a picture alex yes i do lawrence let me get myself prepared for that okay lawrence we're going to take a screenshot of your input for a thumbnail asset if you can look at the screen and give me a big smile in three two one gotcha great excellent okay and with that i am all good to go and you are lawrence we'll do a five count i'll count you down 543 silent 2-1 and then just follow my lead okay sounds great all right leonard we good okay you're off here we go on dave in five four three every ceo is trying to get hybrid right most people they've been working remotely for the better part of two years now and we've spent a lot of time and thought on how to accommodate remote workers and providing tools to make them feel connected and more productive we've also built remote and hybrid models into our hiring ethos making it a feature not a drawback but what about the underlying infrastructure that powers hybrid work how is that evolving to be as flexible scalable and cost effective with the lowest latency possible recent survey data from enterprise technology research shows that 56 percent of executives believe productivity continues to improve with only 14 percent citing recent declines in productivity 26 percent say it's holding steady the question is how do we maintain those positives and minimize the negatives and what role does the network and underlying infrastructure play in evolving new work models welcome to the network powering hybrid work on the cube made possible by cisco my name is dave vellante and i'll be your host today and in this program you're going to hear from experts that are going to discuss and introduce new innovations that are specifically designed to energize and support hybrid work my first guest is lawrence wang who's the vice president of product management at cisco and we're going to dig into wi-fi 6e and what it all means to the future of work lawrence welcome good to see you hey great to be here dave thanks for having me i'm excited to be here today yeah you bet okay my my first big question is you know what's the big rush it feels like we were just talking about the shift from wi-fi you know five to wi-fi six just a few years ago what's going on there yeah i mean you're right right we as since at cisco we introduced our first wi-fi six access points back in 2019 and one of the things that we've seen is a tremendous rate of adoption moving from wi-fi five to wi-fi six over the past couple of years in fact it's one of our fastest transitions that we've seen between wireless standards and a lot of the drivers you know for that we're really just about you know making sure that there's better wi-fi experiences for you know uh people in the office making sure that they can support uh you know more of that you know set of clients reduce the amount of congestion in our time what we've seen is that migration has been tremendous but it also means that you know we're starting to reach that capacity where you know five gigahertz is starting to become more crowded and so many of our customers are looking at well what can i actually do to continue to expand you know that you know that traffic the number of lanes that i can actually support for wireless traffic and for many of them they're looking to wi-fi 6e as the answer to help them do that simply because six gigahertz as part of that standard introduces a whole new spectrum or a whole new highway that we can get client devices on well so it sounds like you're thinking about a different role for offices and campuses going forward so what should listeners expect to see kind of in the in the near term in the midterm and even the long term near term when they get back into the office and in the long term how do you see this playing out yeah i mean that's an interesting question right when you think about you know this context of hybrid work you know work is not a place that you go to but it's really a place that uh you could be where ultimately you are trying to get work done uh it really really is supporting you know that you know quality of experience no matter where you choose to work from and yes yeah while the campus is going to evolve and play a different role it is a critical part of that hybrid work future and the way i see it here is that you know the role of the campus is going to change over time it's not going to be the same that we saw prior to uh you know two years ago and i think for many of our customers about you know what does it mean to invest in that infrastructure for us to continue to adapt to support you know the ways that you know their employees are expected or want to work and a big part of that is investing in infrastructure to support your new ways of working well you know lawrence i mean i've personally been lucky because we go to studio and i've been able to come into the office since the pandemic started but i know a lot of people they're really excited to get back to work in person and face-to-face events and the like and i know others that say you know what i'm moving and i'm always going to remo work remotely i'll never work for another company that forces me to go in the office again so this sounds like a tall order for it organizations to accommodate that diversity how do you think they will be able to plan for and manage all this new complexity yeah i mean i think the reality is uh you know talent it doesn't know any zip codes right and i think one of the boons of you know being able to support a more distributed workforce is to be able to bring in great talent no matter where they're based out of and i think for it teams i think the interesting thing will be you know what are the drivers to bring people back into the office right there has to be a purpose uh that's more meaningful than simply it's a place that i go to every single day you know what are the you know tools and you know applications i bring in to help support collaboration and i think an important part of you know making this a great experience in the context of hybrid work is that you do have to make the office a meaningful place for employees to gather but also making sure that as you connect people around the world as part of your global employee workforce that they still have an equitable experience so for iet teams it is about you know thinking about how do i actually manage this infrastructure that's more distributed but i still have to invest in my you know central campuses and at the same time making sure that i have great quality experiences for everyone unified security policies you know visibility across all the clients and applications but there's also increasing pressure from their it's core constituency we know that people are asking more of it they want them to support new use cases like safe return office that they want it to help you a contributor to you know global corporate initiatives like driving towards uh you know zero uh greenhouse gas emissions so any number of these activities or initiatives is putting more pressure on ig teams yeah interesting i mean so i gotta ask you please don't hate me for this question but was this just luck on cisco's part that you got solutions ready for this sort of hybrid work model so quickly in other words was it something that you were maybe planning that was going to take years for the market to be ready for and it just got compressed because of the pandemic or is this architecture that allows you to be flexible how did you land here in what appears to be a pretty strong position yeah i mean at cisco i think one of the things that you know we think about is you know it's always amazing when you look back at something and then you write the story but i i think if we're being honest with ourselves if you look at what happened from where we were two years ago to where we are today including our competitors and customers i think that no one could have predicted the world that we're operating and living in and so for us the question becomes how did we help our customers support this transition and ultimately it's about investing in architectures and platforms that are flexible that allows our customers support you know use cases that they were thinking of as well as ones that they never anticipated and i think that's really the exciting thing about you know what we've been doing here as part of our hybrid work investments now areas that you know i think you know we double down on and you know in some ways accelerated because of this when i think about you know what our customers care about when they start bringing people back into the office it is about some of these emerging use cases whether it's you know more dynamic way finding being able to understand the density or the air quality of a given environment and these are some of the technologies that we've embedded in some of our you know new uh you know wi-fi 60 access points along with you know our management infrastructure here so i think that it gives our customers and partners a lot more flexibility than what you know they had before to really adapt to the changing needs of today and even beyond well that's something we've certainly learned throughout the pandemic is is the ability to be flexible is fundamental i got to ask you what's your preferred mode of work you going back into the office are you going to stay remote great question you know i have come to appreciate uh you know working from home you know over uh you know the past couple years got to spend a little more time with my kids at lunch but i will say i am looking forward to the day when i can have the choice of being back in the office a few days a week as well as continue to be remote as well as continue to visit my customers and partners uh you know all over this great country in the world so looking forward to that yeah so so you're a true hybrid i guess i'm a hybrid too i like being in the office but i'm traveling a lot when the world returns to the new abnormal anyway lawrence thanks so much for kicking off the program with me now in a minute we're going to dig into the core of the network and understand the role it plays in supporting new and flexible work models you're watching the network powering hybrid work made possible by cisco on thecube your leader in global enterprise tech coverage