Cisco & Splunk reveal unified observability partnership

At Cisco Live, Cisco has revealed its latest endeavour in unified observability in partnership with Splunk. This announcement marks the debut of Cisco’s integration with Splunk, positioning it as a principal player in the field of comprehensive observability solutions. This initiative aims to empower enterprises by delivering more performant and secure digital experiences through enhanced full-stack observability.

The collaboration seeks to unify visibility across various environments including on-premises, hybrid, and multi-cloud setups. By combining Cisco’s extensive network visibility with Splunk’s renowned log analytics and cloud-native observability capabilities, the comprehensive solution allows organisations to reduce blind spots and improve their overall digital performance and security.

Several notable integrations were announced including a unified observability experience for joint customers and the introduction of Splunk Log Observer Connect for Cisco AppDynamics. Additionally, Cisco AppDynamics will now integrate with Splunk IT Service Intelligence (ITSI). These integrations are designed to provide customers with best-in-class support for both traditional and modern application architectures, ensuring visibility across their entire digital landscape.

Innovations introduced at the event include the new AI Assistant for AppDynamics, which provides actionable insights and guidance to users. This tool is intended to help users make faster and more informed decisions. Furthermore, there has been an expansion of AppDynamics' Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) hosting on Microsoft Azure, aimed at supporting multi-cloud strategies and streamlining workflows to avoid vendor lock-ins.

The announcement also highlighted the introduction of advanced AI in Splunk ITSI. This development leverages AI and machine learning to provide more precise alerting and an accurate overview of IT health. The configuration assistant within this AI tool helps IT administrators maintain accurate alerting by optimising outdated threshold models and reducing false positive alerts.

Tom Casey, Senior Vice President and General Manager of Products and Technology at Splunk, emphasised the importance of this collaboration, stating, “By bringing together Splunk and Cisco observability solutions, customers now have unified visibility across their entire digital footprint. This integration helps them detect, investigate, and resolve problems faster, creating a reliable and resilient user experience.”

The integrations and new features aim to accommodate various IT environments, whether traditional, hybrid, or cloud-native. For instance, Splunk Log Observer Connect for Cisco AppDynamics combines Splunk’s powerful platform with Cisco’s application performance monitoring (APM) to drive faster, in-context troubleshooting. Similarly, the integration of Cisco AppDynamics with Splunk Enterprise, Splunk Cloud, and Splunk ITSI is designed to reduce alert noise and improve overall troubleshooting.

Cisco AppDynamics’ expansion onto Microsoft Azure further enhances its cloud-hosted observability offerings, aligning with strategies aimed at minimising cloud vendor lock-ins. It also facilitates compliance with industry-specific regulatory requirements, ensuring organisations can streamline their workflows effectively.

Stephen Elliot, Group Vice President and Analyst at IDC, applauded the efforts, noting, “Now, with Cisco and Splunk, you get the strength of Cisco AppDynamics and Splunk Observability, powered by Generative AI. This offers customers a comprehensive opportunity to achieve observability for the entire enterprise.”