Episode 6: AI in Networking - Benefits, Challenges, and How to Begin

0:05 Hello, I'm Bob Laliberte, Principal Analyst of the Cube Research, and welcome to this episode of the QA and I I'm joined by Matthias Kokot, the VP of Cloud Ready Data Centers.

0:17 And today we're going to delve into the topic of blueprints for AI.

0:22 Great to see you again, Matthias,

0:23 Welcome.

0:24 Hey, great to see you, Bob as well.

0:26 Yeah, so why don't we get started by maybe doing a quick recap of 2024.

0:32 It's been a pretty busy year for Juniper.

0:34 You kicked it off by launching your AI native networking platform.

0:38 So I'm wondering if you could discuss how AI is changing how enterprises are interfacing with networks today.

0:45 Yeah, happy, happy to really happy to hear, you know, about our AI native networking platform is the industry's first platform, you know, purpose built to assure the best operator and end user experiences.

0:59 This platform represents a huge leap forward for the AI and networking environments, but it also represents the quickest and most effective way to deploy high performance AI training and inference networks, you know, predictive actions and faster problem resolutions.

1:18 The result is a smarter, more effective, you know, network that drives immediate and sustained value for our customers.

1:25

And by our ultimate vision of 100% elimination of network related, you know, trouble tickets might seem, you know to be a lofty goal.

1:36 The reality is that we are already delivering game changing and quantifiable real time and real world outcomes right now.

1:45 So just as an example, you know, ServiceNow is reporting a 90% elimination of network related trouble tickets, 50% faster deployment of the full stack wired, wireless and SD Wan solutions and they've achieved an impressive 60% cost avoidance in network, you know, CapEx and OpEx spending.

2:07 And this is just one example to show basically the power of AI native.

2:14 Yeah, I think those are all those are all great examples and they're certainly resonates with the conversations that I've had with your customers and really points to the fact that AI is changing the way network operations teams are interfacing with the network.

2:28 And because the reality is today, the network operator's job is becoming a lot more difficult.

2:34 There's, you know, huge growth in the number of users, devices, apps that are all accessing the network and they're all highly distributed as well.

2:44 So as a result, things are getting more complex.

2:47 And we just did some research that validates that 80% of organizations on our survey came back and said the network's either more or much more complex than it was two years ago.

2:57 And a lot of that when we, when we drilled down into why that was, what we found is that there's a lot more traffic going across the network.

3:06 Organizations have to deal with multiple management tools.

3:09 And of course, there's that distributed nature of the network.

3:13 The really fascinating part of this, though, is when we, when we asked organizations about the

importance of the network, over 9 out of 10 came back and said that the networks were really critical to achieving their business goals.

3:27 You know, I think we, we, we all see the potential of AI, you know, nowadays as undeniable.

3:32 I mean it, it, it promises a huge, you know, opportunities for, you know, companies, economic, you know, growth increase, you know, productivity, you know, job creation.

3:43 But we've seen that, you know, with, you know, let's say, you know, many disruptions and you know, any major technological shift.

3:50 It also brings its own set of, you know, challenges, you know, whether this would be, you know, skill gaps, complicated implementations, you know, deployments, the lack actually of, you know, trusted, you know, solutions, you know, overall.

4:05 And then also the, you know, the adoption cost that for, you know, many, many, many enterprises, you know, many businesses is probably hard, you know, to, you know, overcome.

4:15 I assume there's some variation based on skill set and knowledge, but I'm wondering if you could just share from your experience about, you know, roughly how long should organizations expect to get through, especially some of those early stages, which is the knowledge and testing and, and all that?

4:31 No, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a great question, you know, Bob, and I think it totally depends on, on, on the customer, you know, to be honest, you know, they are usually it's like the size, you know, the size of the customer, you know, they experience with AI.

4:47 You know, overall it's been fascinating because when we, when we did the research, we asked about deploying AI and challenges around deploying AI.

4:55 And it was interesting that the number one challenge in organizations, well, first of all, almost everyone had challenges, right?

5:01 8, almost 90%, I think it was 88% of organizations said we had a challenge trying to deploy AI.

5:07 But the number one challenge was that a, it was the, you know, basically that lack of a single AI engine across all of the domains across the network.

5:16 I think that's just as important.

5:17 And especially when you're getting into something new like AI and you're going to be growing it, maybe starting in one domain and expanding to others.

5:24 It's going to be really important for organizations to have that flexibility and that predictability and also obviously the ability to to save some money while they're doing it as well so they can gain the benefits in additional domain.

5:36 So that was, that was great.

5:39 I love those examples as well.

5:41 That brings me to the fact that, you know, as I just mentioned, there are a lot of organizations getting started, right, just beginning their AI journeys and they're going to lack the requisite skills or the knowledge to be able to design and, and implement a solution.

5:55 Got it.

5:56 Well, certainly, you know, that sounds like you, you've really thought this through and it's a comprehensive approach to how to accelerate the adoption of these AI solutions.

6:05 You know, one of the things that the research that we did highlighted was some of the benefits that organizations got from deploying these these AI solutions for networking, Things like better operational efficiency, faster times to find and fix problems, better customer experiences.

6:23 It's really relatively easy to understand why, you know, businesses, you know, today are looking for ways to work smarter, not necessarily harder.

6:33 And our platform really helps them.

6:35 You know, just do, you know that a huge benefit of our platform is the faster problem, you know, resolution you, you, you'll be asked for, you know, some, you know, examples there.

6:47 So we've had, you know, customers, especially in critical industries like healthcare increase basically availability and the reliability, you know, say of the network, you know, significantly, you know, one of one of our customers, it's healthcare, you know, organization, you know, shared with us with, you know, Juniper AI.

7:07 They were able to find and fix, you know, network disruptions in minutes instead of hours or days, enabling, you know, them to deliver, you know, better patient, you know, care.

7:19 User experience is another area where we see, you know, big wins.

7:23 You know, for example, one of our retail, you know, customers improved their Wi-Fi and overall network, you know, reliability across hundreds of stores, making the in store experience, you know, better and smoother, you know, not only for, you know, the customers, but you know, for the employees as well.

7:40 And perhaps the most exciting part is that these improvements in operational efficiency give IT times, IT teams, you know, more time, you know, to work on strategic projects.

7:53 One large enterprise customer of ours reduce their manual troubleshooting by more than 70% with our AI automating, you know, routine network, you know, task, you know, catching, you know, issues before they become problems.

8:11 That takes actually much out of the daily network management of our customers, takes it basically off, you know, their plates.

8:19 So they can spend more time on strategic, you know, areas, you know, expanding into new markets, pushing forward with their own, you know, digital transformation, you know, efforts.

8:32 When you look at it, you know, from, you know, from that angle, it's not just about, you know, making today's networks, you know, better.

8:38 It's about setting the stage for future growth and innovation.

8:42 But I, the hard part is you, you can't get those benefits unless you get started on your AI journey.

8:49 And so I'll share an another little tidbit of research from our our survey that we did.

8:54 And it was really fascinating because we asked the question about, you know, would you switch network vendors if they had better AI capabilities?

9:02 And typically when we ask these questions about just different types of technical capabilities, at most we might see 50% say they would interesting.

9:13 In this survey about AI, 97% said they would be willing to switch their network vendors if they had better AI capabilities.

9:24 Certainly, as you mentioned at the beginning, Juniper's been working on this for about a dozen years now or 10 years now.

9:30 I guess it is.

9:31 And, and so you're seeing some real results from the actual mature deployments that you have.

9:38 I'm wondering if you're also starting to see this shift in organizations recognizing the value of AI and wanting to start their AI journey regardless of who they currently have in place today.

9:51 No, absolutely, absolutely, Bob.

9:53 I mean, organizations, you know, definitely are recognizing the value of AI, you know, driven solutions and, and, and then do you, you know, act, you know, on it and your stat that, you know, 97%, you know, would switch actually vendors for better AI really highlights how critical AI has become in networking, you know, decisions and you know, it.

10:16 I, I actually, I believe it's an exciting, you know, time, you know, there.

10:19 And we actually believe we are at the forefront of this AI journey.

10:24

And we recognize that leveraging AI is filled with both, you know, immense, you know, challenges and tremendous opportunities.

10:32 And you know, I believe, you know, if organizations aren't embracing, you know, AI in their networks now, their risk falling behind AI capabilities are what will set hard networks today as the ones that are ready for, you know, tomorrow.

10:50 So my advice, just don't wait.

10:53 The benefits are real and measurable.

10:55 As I, you know, pointed out, you know, earlier with, you know, some of the examples, you know, that I gave, the longer organizations delay, the more they miss out on better overall user and operations experiences.

11:10 So start the AI journey now, start them, you know, with us in order to future proof your network for, you know, tomorrow.

11:17 That is really my advice.

11:19 Yeah, I think that's great advice.

11:21 I I often, what I give as well, You have to get started in order to get those benefits.

11:26 Once you get started, you'll realize the value it can bring to an organization and it will become more widespread and more widespread use so you can work on more of those strategic initiatives and be of greater value to your business as well.

11:39 So again, thank you everyone for joining.

11:41 I'm Bob Laliberte, Principal Analyst at the Cube Research, and I also want to thank my guest, Mathias Kokot from Juniper Networks.

11:51 If you have any questions or want to learn more about these solutions, please visit the Juniper website.