IT giant Cisco recently announced a new AI-powered collaboration solution that will create “future-proofed” experiences for customers, employees, and IT teams.
Cisco’s new agentic AI innovations include the general availability of the Webex AI Agent to boost customer experience, new workflows in the AI Assistant for the Webex Suite to streamline employee experiences, Webex Calling Customer Assist, new features within the Webex Control Hub, and AirPlay on Cisco Devices for Microsoft Teams Rooms.
“Enterprises are starting to realize the potential of agentic AI. It is reinventing what it means for people and technology to work together across the physical and digital worlds,” said Jeetu Patel, Executive Vice President and Chief Product Officer, Cisco. “Our customers love how Webex AI is built seamlessly into the way you work. Working alongside employees increasing efficiency, improving employee sentiment, and enhancing overall customer experiences.”
Establishing CX centers with AI
With new innovations through Webex, Cisco is enabling the transformation of traditional contact centers into experience centers to improve customer interactions. Through the Webex Customer Experience portfolio, tools like AI Agent and AI Assistant for Contact Center can answer customers’ questions and integrate with back-office systems for automated intent fulfillment.
New AI solutions to enable these centers include:
- Webex AI Agent: Cisco intends to make this solution generally available on March 31, 2025. It is a 24/7 self-service solution with natural, human-like interactions. The solution works alongside human agents to answer routine and high-volume customer questions and executes actions to fulfill customer requests while eliminating the need for queues or wait times. Further, it integrates out-of-the-box with the Webex Contact Center. It combines natural-sounding conversational intelligence with real-time automation so that customers can resolve issues and questions as if they were communicating with a human.
- Cisco AI Assistant for Webex Contact Center: This generally available AI solution will receive new features in Q2 2025. These new features include suggested responses and real-time transcription for agents.
AI-powered employee experiences
Cisco says that employees can utilize AI-powered tools to boost productivity as they become available later this year. These tools include workflow automation that streamlines routine tasks and the ability to customize and manage AI capabilities and insights.
Among the AI solutions to boost employee experiences include:
- Workflow Automation in Cisco AI Assistant for Webex: Within the Cisco AI Assistant for Webex Suite, this capability streamlines processes and saves time by working across enterprise apps like Salesforce, ServiceNow, and Jira. Users can more efficiently complete tasks and automatically share meeting summaries across enterprise applications.
- AI Capabilities in Webex Control Hub: Allows IT admins to easily access, search, and manage all AI ecosystems in one place, along with the ability to customize them to match their organization’s needs. Further, IT admins will be able to customize them to match their organization’s needs. IT admins can also view analytics on AI usage, trends, and employee adoption metrics within Webex Control Hub.
- Webex Calling Customer Assist: This calling solution works to help any employee assist customers with an AI-powered, modern experience in the Webex app on their desktop or mobile phone. Customer Assist allows local and regional branches, including retail stores, bank branches, pharmacies, and healthcare clinics to quickly provide improved customer service experiences, resolve issues, and build strong relationships. New features will be available for this calling solution later this year to provide efficient call routing, AI assistance for agents and supervisors, and powerful analytics in an easy-to-deploy, cost-effective Webex Calling offering.
- Apple AirPlay: This tool will be available on Cisco Devices for Microsoft Teams Rooms. It enables instant wireless content sharing from iPhones, iPads, and Macs to Cisco Devices.
- Cisco Spatial Meetings: A tool that allows users to turn any space equipped with a Cisco Room Bar Pro into an immersive studio with Webex for Apple Vision Pro.
- Glean: Through this solution, and with connectors across enterprise apps, users can enhance discussions, search Webex, and speed up decision-making with knowledge graphs and connectors.
- Native Epic integration for Webex Contact Center: This tool is expected to be in beta this month. It will enable contact center agents to access patient information more easily as they manage interactions within the electronic health record (EHR) software.
Cisco has announced several new solutions for its channel partners and customers this year. Catch up on the data center and infrastructure solutions it released in February.