Mobile technology has had a strong effect on practically every facet of the IT world and this goes well beyond wireless technology and the cloud. Cisco (News - Alert) knows this, which is why it has been talking a lot lately about the “Internet of Everything” and an app-based approach for everything, from the data center to networking.
In fact, at Interop 2013 last week, Cisco CEO John Chambers (News - Alert) had a lot to say on the subject of the Internet of Everything, what Cisco defines as the growing network of physical objects capable of communicating over the Internet, and its application infrastructure approach. As the number of connected devices continues to grow — Chambers forecasts that there will be 500 billion by 2020 — the infrastructure supporting those devices will need to grow as well. That’s where application infrastructure comes in.
This infrastructure aims to make networks more programmable, automated and capable in terms of handling the applications that are being created as part of the Internet of Everything. In other words, Cisco is thinking about the broader implications of the Internet of Everything; namely the data use that stems from apps.
Since there are apps for nearly every task under the sun — from shopping and banking to social media and chatting — it’s apps that will be responsible for a great deal of the network strain going forward. To deal with this, Cisco is bringing software-defined networking and virtualization from the data center to the networks of the world. According to Chambers, this will require “brutal consolidation” on a technical level across the entire IT industry, adding, “Just like there was in communications, you will see the same thing in IT occur, and it will be an application economy.”
While this suggests that there will be some huge changes going forward as companies unable to keep up with this change may fall behind and even disappear, for the consumer, there likely won’t be any discernible change. In fact, that’s kind of the point; Cisco is trying to facilitate the current trend toward mobile and apps to meet consumer demand.
Edited by Rachel Ramsey