Cisco’s Q3 earnings report delivered a clear message: the company is firing on all cylinders, and its UC portfolio Webex is no exception.
With a 24% year-over-year increase in earnings for these segments, Cisco is demonstrating that its investments in innovation, AI, and customer-centric solutions are paying off.
But what’s really driving this surge? From a wave of new updates to building out partnerships, here are some of the biggest announcements that could have brought Webex some new customers.
A Strong Quarter Anchored by Innovation and Execution
Cisco’s Q3 results exceeded expectations across the board.
“Q3 was another strong quarter for Cisco with revenue, margins, and earnings per share all above the high end of our guidance ranges,”
Chuck Robbins, Chair and CEO of Cisco, emphasized.
“We also generated solid growth in annualized recurring revenue, remaining performance obligations, and subscription revenue, which all support our future performance.”
Webex, offering everything from UCaaS to CCaaS, runs on a subscription model.
Cisco’s Earnings in Numbers
For the quarter, total revenue was $14,100,000,000 up 11% year over year. Non GAAP net income was $3,800,000,000 and non GAAP earnings per share was $0.96 Total product revenue was $10,400,000,000 up 15% and services revenue was $3,800,000,000 up 3%.
Last year, the company revealed that Webex Contact Center seats surged by 75 percent in the financial year of 2024.
These numbers show that such momentum is at least maintaining pace, if not growing.
The company’s focus on recurring revenue and subscription models is particularly relevant in the UC space, where customers increasingly seek predictable, scalable solutions.
Robbins highlighted that “total product orders grew 20% year over year or 9% on an organic basis excluding Splunk,” and pointed to “accelerated product innovation and solid execution by our teams driving sustained demand for our technologies.”
This is critical context for understanding the Webex and CPaaS momentum: Cisco isn’t just selling more licenses-it’s building deeper, stickier customer relationships through recurring cloud services.
Enterprise adoption is also a key driver.
Robbins noted, “Enterprise product orders were up 22% year over year in Q3, driven by double-digit growth in the Americas and APJC.”
This robust demand from large organizations underscores how Cisco’s UC solutions are meeting the evolving needs of distributed, hybrid workforces, especially as organizations seek secure, integrated collaboration tools.
Webex: AI-Powered Collaboration and Platform Expansion
Webex has undergone a significant transformation over the quarter, with several major announcements that could have contributed to its growth trajectory.
Cisco has doubled down on AI-powered features within Webex, aiming to enhance user productivity and meeting experiences.
Yet it’s also focused on backend administration and broadening its compatibility, even with emerging trends outside UC, such as AR and VR headsets.
In May, Cisco rolled out a major security enhancement for Webex Contact Center’s Flow Designer, introducing certificate-based OAuth2 authentication for custom HTTPS connectors-including a dedicated connector for Microsoft Dynamics 365.
This update empowers enterprises to establish robust, certificate-backed trust relationships between Webex Contact Center and third-party APIs, significantly raising the bar for integration security.
Administrators and developers can now leverage this capability to meet stringent enterprise security requirements, especially when connecting to sensitive platforms like Microsoft Dynamics 365.
Cisco also addressed a long-standing pain point in call transfer and conference workflows within Webex Contact Center.
As of April, agents are no longer required to wait for another agent to pick up before releasing a call to an entry point. Now, agents can immediately release calls into the IVR or queue, freeing them up to handle other interactions without delay.
This enhancement not only streamlines the call-handling process but also improves overall agent efficiency and customer experience by reducing unnecessary wait times.
Additionally, the update introduces support for blind transfers during conference operations, allowing for more flexible and efficient call routing.
March saw a raft of big updates.
Cisco announced the general availability of Cisco Spatial Meetings, a feature that transforms any space equipped with a Cisco Room Bar Pro into a mixed-reality collaboration studio using Webex on Apple Vision Pro devices.
This innovation enables remote and hybrid teams to interact in a spatially rich environment, facilitating content sharing, 3D object manipulation, and more natural collaboration.
Cisco C-suite Shakeup
Chuck Robbins said Cisco’s CFO Scott Herren will retire on July 26 after joining in 2020, to be succeeded by Mark Patterson, Cisco’s Chief Strategy Officer and 20+ year company veteran.
Perhaps its biggest announcement of the quarter, Cisco’s vision for agentic AI collaboration materialized with the introduction of the Webex AI Agent and Cisco AI Assistant for Webex Contact Center.
The Webex AI Agent delivers 24/7 self-service with natural, human-like interactions, handling routine and high-volume customer inquiries while integrating with back-office systems for automated intent fulfillment.
The Cisco AI Assistant provides suggested responses and real-time transcription for agents, alongside existing capabilities like context transfer summaries, dropped call summaries, Agent Wellbeing analytics, and Auto CSAT.
These AI tools are designed to streamline workflows, enhance employee sentiment, and improve customer experiences by integrating seamlessly with enterprise apps such as Salesforce, ServiceNow, and Jira.
Security, Ecosystem, and Looking Ahead
Security remains a central pillar of Cisco’s UC value proposition, and this quarter’s results reflect growing customer demand for secure collaboration and communications.
As Robbins put it, “Safety and security will be the defining challenge of agentic AI, and we recently introduced several innovations designed to help security professionals harness the power of AI while keeping security at the forefront.”
These innovations come in the form of its AI Defense, announced in January.
The new solution is designed to provide comprehensive protection for both the development and utilization of AI applications within an organization, enabling businesses to feel confident to advance their AI initiatives.
For B2B buyers, the ability to embed security directly into the fabric of the network and collaboration stack is a key differentiator.
Looking ahead, Cisco’s leadership changes and continued focus on innovation signal that the company is not resting on its laurels.
The promotion of Jeetu Patel to President and Chief Product Officer, and the appointment of Kevin Will from OpenAI to the Board the day before the earnings call, suggest a renewed emphasis on product vision and AI expertise.
In an era of agentic AI and the race to implement it, will that be the next big announcement? We’ll have to wait and see.
