- Cisco is in the early stages of preparing for space data centers
- CEO Chuck Robbins said, "I wouldn't bet against Elon."
- Robbins sees telcos positioned to benefit from inferencing grids that dynamically route AI workloads based on power, cost and capacity
Cisco is exploring entry into the space race. CEO Chuck Robbins is a big believer in the future of space data centers, and the company is starting to look into products for that emerging market.
Appearing on an episode of The Vergecast, Robbins gave a direct answer when asked whether we should put data centers in space.
"Absolutely," Robbins said. "And we will."
Space doesn't have the power constraints of terrestrial data centers, due to the "unlimited and unimpeded" availability of solar energy, Robbins said. Space-based data centers don't have to deal with growing opposition to locating data centers in local communities.
Robbins noted that Elon Musk advocates space-based data centers. On the other hand, Sam Altman says the idea of putting data centers in space is "ridiculous," Vergecast host Nilay Patel, editor-in-chief of The Verge, pointed out. So maybe space-based data centers are a pipe dream?
"I wouldn't bet against Elon," Robbins responded.
Robbins: It's early days for Cisco in space
Cisco is in "very early stages" of getting into that market, Robbins said. Cisco teams approached him several months ago. "My head of product said, 'We really have to be prepared for data centers in space.' I looked at him like he was crazy. Subsequent to that, we’ve just been talking about how we don’t even know everything we need to do yet. We’re in the early stages of just making sure the atmospheric issues, the temperatures, all of those things are taken into consideration," Robbins said.
He added, "I grew up on a farm in Georgia, so the last thing I ever thought I’d be talking about are data centers in space. Even five years ago, I wouldn’t have thought I’d be talking about it."
6G potential
The interview also discussed 5G and upcoming 6G networks. "I think if you asked the telecom CEOs, they would probably say that they’re disappointed in the return they got on all the investment around 5G," Robbins said. "I think robotics in general could be the real driver of 6G utilization once it gets built." But it's still early days, he said.
Like much of the industry, Robbins sees inference growing into a major part of the business of AI, which will require distributed infrastructure. Enterprises "are going to want to do inferencing at a point of interaction with a customer and garner immediate value in that interaction," he said.
The telco inference opportunity
Nvidia is partnering with telcos on delivering more compute to the edge for AI applications, Patel noted. AT&T and Comcast are partnering with Cisco and Nvidia on deploying Nvidia's AI Grid distributed AI infrastructure.
Inferencing could be key to telcos' unlocking new revenue streams. "I think this may be a good opportunity for the telecom providers," Robbins said. "There has always been this thesis that edge compute was going to be a big benefit for them.... There are discussions now of inferencing grids and the dynamic routing of these inferencing requests based on everything from cost of power at a given time of day to capacity that’s available."
As for terrestrial data centers, Robbins said local resistance can be overcome if the data center provider makes a real commitment to the community, such as by increasing utility capacity.
Robbins hit other interesting points in the wide-ranging interview, including enterprises' return to private data centers, Cisco's investment in silicon, coopetition with Nvidia, which is getting into the networking business in a big way, security, geopolitical issues and the AI bubble.
Watch or listen to the interview here: Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins wants data centers in space
And check out the latest free report from Fierce Network Research: "Risk, reward, and revenue: Defining the telco role in the AI economy."