With new leadership, key acquisitions, and a platform-based vision, Cisco is betting big on security.

Cisco’s dominance in networking and telecommunications products and services is well established, but its role in cybersecurity is less cemented. It has provided security software and network security appliances for some time, and it’s one of the dominant players in network firewalls and network access control, according to Neil MacDonald, vice president and distinguished analyst at research firm Gartner. However, these segments are not growing as fast as newer areas of security such as secure access service edge (SASE), security service edge (SSE), and cloud security, MacDonald says.