Cisco unveils framework to transform workforce collaboration with AI agents
At WebexOne 2025 in San Diego this week, Cisco introduced a sweeping vision for workplace collaboration that goes far beyond video calls and chats.
The tech giant’s Connected Intelligence framework represents a fundamental shift in how employees will work — not just with each other but alongside AI agents that act as digital teammates capable of automating routine tasks, managing workflows and even conducting their own inter-agent communications.
“We’re building AI agents into Webex today that will amplify our collective productivity and fundamentally improve how people connect with each other, how they interact with AI, and how AI agents themselves collaborate,” said Jeetu Patel, Cisco’s president and chief product officer.
AI agents enter workforce
The centerpiece of Cisco’s announcement is a suite of specialized AI agents designed to eliminate workplace friction. These aren’t simple automation scripts; rather, they are proactive digital workers that understand context and take initiative.
The Task Agent automatically generates action items from meeting transcripts, eliminating the need for manual follow-up. The Notetaker Agent captures real-time transcriptions and summaries of impromptu in-person meetings, ensuring that spontaneous brainstorming sessions don’t vanish into the ether. A Polling Agent proactively recommends live polls during meetings to boost engagement, while a Meeting Scheduler identifies when follow-ups are needed and autonomously finds available times.
Then there is the AI Receptionist for Webex Calling, which acts as an always-on virtual assistant capable of handling routine inquiries, transferring calls and scheduling appointments. “Every branch office can now have a receptionist they probably typically don’t have today,” said Snorre Kjesbu, Cisco’s senior vp of collaboration. “Which means that Joe and Mary and the person in the workshop can actually go about doing their day job, which is not to answer phones.”
A decade-long investment
Cisco’s collaboration leadership points to strategic foresight as its competitive advantage. A decade ago, long before AI became the latest must-have technology, the company was already working with Nvidia to embed AI capabilities in meeting room devices. That early investment created what Kjesbu calls “a full library of algorithms” that can be combined in novel ways.
The payoff is tangible. The current generation of Nvidia processors delivers AI performance 7,000 times more powerful than earlier versions, enabling features that were previously impossible. Cisco’s new RoomOS 26 operating system leverages that computing power to deliver a Director Agent that autonomously adjusts camera views to create cinematic meeting experiences, and Audio Zones that allow IT teams to define digital boundaries in seconds for the AI-powered Ceiling Mic Pro.
Aside from those, the Workspace Advisor Agent uses advanced cameras and Nvidia chipsets to create a 3D “digital twin” of physical meeting spaces, giving IT teams unprecedented insight into optimizing room configurations.
Breaking down data silos
Cisco is taking an open ecosystem approach, integrating with the enterprise applications where work actually happens. Through partnerships with Amazon Q, Microsoft 365 Copilot, Salesforce and Jira, the Cisco AI Assistant can search across multiple knowledge repositories and even perform tasks in third-party applications — like creating tickets or generating leads — without users leaving Webex.
“Collaboration shouldn’t be viewed in a very transactional manner,” said Amit Barave, vp of product management for Webex. “Take any project. You’ll have a number of different kinds of interactions during that time, random calls between people, meetings with everyone. You have a treasure trove of insights, and if you use it well with the collaboration experience overall, this is under-appreciated.”
The Microsoft integration is bidirectional: Webex users can access Microsoft SharePoint and OneDrive files through Cisco AI Assistant, while Microsoft Copilot users can search and access Webex meeting summaries directly in Copilot. This cross-platform fluidity addresses a critical pain point: 85% of Cisco’s customers use two or more meeting platforms.
“If you look at it, 85% of our customers use two or more meeting platforms,” Kjesbu said. “That means that you have to be interoperable if you’re going to be relevant.”
Modes of collaboration
According to Cisco executives, the future of work involves three distinct types of interaction: people-to-people, people-to-AI and AI-to-AI communication.
“You could just imagine that you have an AI co-worker that’s actually participating in the meeting with you,” Kjesbu explained. “You have AI to AI where you have information that’s being provided by an AI agent to another AI agent.”
That represents a shift as significant as the transitions from landline to mobile or from on-premises to cloud, but potentially more transformative. “This inflection point is much bigger than the three others because it impacts technology, it impacts security, it impacts how people interact,” Kjesbu said. “It impacts the whole way we both develop our products and the way we work.”
The technology arrives at a critical moment. Barave identified team engagement as the top workplace challenge clients are raising — “a function of all things the workforce has gone through in the last five years” with remote and hybrid work transitions.
Measurable impact
Cisco is tracking two primary metrics for success: quality and adoption. On the adoption front, the results are striking. Usage of features like meeting summarization and action-item generation increased fivefold in just the last three months versus the past year.
As organizations navigate this transformation, Cisco’s philosophy leans toward iteration, not perfection.
“We can sit and think about something forever, and what we ship will be accurately wrong,” Kjesbu said. “It’s better to do something approximately right, to get it out and get the feedback.”
With the general availability of most features planned between Q4 2025 and Q1 2026, employers won’t have to wait long to test whether Cisco’s vision of Connected Intelligence delivers on its promise to fundamentally reshape how work gets done.