Cisco AI PODs: Pre-validated, Flexible, and
Modular AI Infrastructure Data Sheet

Value statement

Cisco AI PODs deliver modular, secure, and pre-validated AI infrastructure, accelerating the full AI lifecycle with unmatched flexibility, simplicity, and rapid deployment.

Cisco AI PODs pre-validated hardware and software stack.

Product overview

Cisco AI PODs are the foundation of the Cisco Secure AI Factory, providing a full-stack, modular infrastructure platform for enterprise AI. Developed in partnership with NVIDIA and leading storage vendors, AI PODs combine Cisco UCS compute, Cisco Nexus networking, advanced GPUs, and robust software to support every stage of the AI lifecycle: from training and fine-tuning to high-throughput inferencing.

AI PODs address the key challenges facing enterprises: scaling AI workloads, ensuring data security and compliance, and simplifying infrastructure management. The architecture features high-bandwidth, lossless networking, best-in-class GPU servers, and pre-validated designs to reduce setup time by up to 50 percent and accelerate time to value. Integrated with Cisco Intersight and Nexus Dashboard, AI PODs deliver unified management, automation, and operational visibility.

Flexible deployment options support on-premises, hybrid, or cloud integration, empowering organizations to innovate with AI confidently, securely, and at scale. Whether optimizing large language models, deploying real-time analytics at the edge, or supporting multitenant GPU cloud environments, Cisco AI PODs enable IT and AI teams to move from pilot to production with ease.

Features and benefits

Table 1.           AI Pod expansion landscape

Prominent feature

Security-first architecture for enterprise AI

Cisco AI PODs uniquely embed enterprise-grade security at every layer. With integrated Cisco AI Defense, Hypershield, and Isovalent Enterprise Platform, organizations can proactively defend against AI-specific threats (for example, prompt injection, adversarial attacks, and unauthorized access) and ensure regulatory compliance and data sovereignty. Security is validated across the full stack, including networking, compute, and software, supporting even the most sensitive workloads.

High-performance, scalable infrastructure

AI PODs leverage platforms such as Cisco UCS C845A and C885A M8 servers with NVIDIA H100/H200 and NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition GPUs, coupled with Nexus 9000 Series Switches supporting up to 800G bandwidth. This combination delivers lossless, low-latency networking and sustained throughput for AI model training, fine-tuning, and inferencing. The modular scale-unit design allows seamless growth from 32 to 128+ GPUs, making your investments future-ready as AI needs expand.

Deployment simplicity and flexibility

Cisco AI PODs feature pre-validated designs (Cisco Validated Designs [CVDs] and NVIDIA Enterprise Reference Architectures [ERAs]), plug-and-play deployment, and unified management through Cisco Intersight. This reduces setup complexity and accelerates time to value—enabling IT and AI teams to deploy, scale, and manage AI infrastructure with confidence, whether on premises, at the edge, or in hybrid environments.

Platform support

Table 2.           Platform support for Cisco AI PODs

Note: The platforms supported will be regularly updated.

Licensing

Cisco AI PODs offer flexible licensing for both hardware and software components.

●     NVIDIA AI Enterprise: Per-GPU subscription (1-, 3-, 5-year terms)

●     Red Hat OpenShift: Subscription per node/core (1-, 3-, 5-year)

●     Cisco Intersight: Essentials/Advantage, per node

●     Optional: Ubuntu or Rancher OS storage licenses as needed

Table 3.           AI PODs licensing summary

Note: The licensing summary highlighted above only concerns those software components that are available on Cisco Commerce. Clients can utilize other software licenses by directly purchasing from external vendors.

Product specifications

Table 4.           Cisco AI PODs specifications (The example given is an UCS-AIPOD-POD2scale unit.)

System requirements

Table 5.           Cisco AI PODs system requirements

Ordering information

To order Cisco AI PODs, visit the Cisco Ordering Home Page or contact your Cisco account representative. For configuration and quoting, use the unified AI POD MLB (major line bundle) SKUs.

Table 6.           Cisco AI PODs ordering information (sample)

Warranty information

Cisco AI POD hardware products carry a standard 90-day limited hardware warranty; extended support and service contracts are available.

Product sustainability

Information about Cisco’s Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) initiatives and performance is provided in Cisco’s CSR and sustainability reporting.

Cisco AI PODs are engineered for sustainability, supporting customer ESG goals with energy efficiency, recyclable packaging, and materials transparency.

Table 7.           Cisco environmental sustainability information

Cisco and partner services

Services from Cisco and our certified partners accelerate deployment and maximize the value of Cisco AI PODs. Cisco CX Success Tracks provide full-stack support, solution adoption services, and ongoing optimization. Mint partners offer pre-sales assessments, proof-of-concept support, and tailored implementation for advanced AI workloads. Learn more at Cisco Services

Cisco Capital

Flexible payment solutions to help you achieve your objectives

Cisco Capital makes it easier to get the right technology to achieve your objectives, enable business transformation and help you stay competitive. We can help you reduce the total cost of ownership, conserve capital, and accelerate growth. In more than 100 countries, our flexible payment solutions can help you acquire hardware, software, services and complementary third-party equipment in easy, predictable payments. Learn more.

For more information

Accelerate your AI transformation today

Ready to scale AI securely and efficiently? Discover how Cisco AI PODs can help you operationalize AI across your enterprise—from pilot to production.

Request a demo, explore detailed specifications, or contact your Cisco representative at: https://www.cisco.com/site/us/en/solutions/artificial-intelligence/infrastructure/ai-pods.html.

Document history

Table 8.           Document history