Cisco study says 73% expect AI network limits within 24 months

Cisco said enterprises are facing campus and branch network constraints as they scale artificial intelligence deployments, with 73% of respondents saying AI expansion will cause them to hit capacity limits within 24 months. Cisco said more than half of enterprises now have widespread generative AI deployments.

Cisco said respondents reported a 34% average increase in campus and branch network traffic tied to AI workloads over the past year, with a further 96% spike expected within the coming year. The study also found 67% of respondents saw increases in internal data traffic tied to AI workloads, while 61% reported growth in continuous automated traffic generated by AI systems.

Cisco said security is also limiting AI scale, with respondents citing expanded attack surfaces, shadow AI activity, weak visibility into AI-driven traffic and inconsistent policy enforcement. The report found 91% of UK businesses are adding security controls specifically for new AI workloads, and more than half of UK respondents said their current campus and branch security posture may be insufficient for next-generation AI workloads.

Related questions

• What did Cisco say about AI-related capacity limits on campus and branch networks?
• How much AI-related network traffic growth did Cisco respondents report and expect?
• What security issues did Cisco identify as barriers to scaling AI workloads?