In this interview from MWC Barcelona 2026, Jeetu Patel, president and chief product officer of Cisco, joins theCUBE’s John Furrier and Dave Vellante to discuss the massive infrastructure refresh driven by the transition from simple chatbots to agentic AI. Patel explores how telecom operators are repositioning themselves at the center of a secure global connectivity fabric to become "token-generation factories." He breaks down the three primary constraints facing the AI revolution – infrastructure, trust and context – and explains Cisco’s strategy to provide the essential guardrails and high-performance networking needed to power the next wave of autonomous digital workers.

The conversation also dives into the strategic importance of Cisco’s custom ASIC strategy and its complementary partnership with NVIDIA to enable scale-out and scale-across networking. Patel highlights the move toward a unified, hyper-converged edge where inference happens in real-time, supported by ultra-low latency and energy-efficient systems. From the role of digital twins in creating self-healing networks to the projected $5 trillion investment in data center build-outs, Patel provides a roadmap for how enterprises and service providers can navigate the supply-constrained AI era with a coherent, full-stack approach.

In this interview from MWC Barcelona 2026, Stephen Rose, chief executive officer of Render Networks, joins theCUBE’s John Furrier and Dave Vellante to discuss the massive infrastructure refresh currently transforming the telecom industry. Rose highlights how carriers are evolving into AI operators, shifting from legacy, voice-optimized systems to data-centric architectures at the edge. He dives into the friction hindering this rollout – from outdated permitting processes to the reliance on manual spreadsheets – and explains why aligning the value chain between telecom, power grids and hyperscalers is critical for meeting the explosive demand for AI connectivity.

The conversation also explores Render Networks’ latest methodology for efficient deployment, including the announcement of Clearway, a suite of agentic AI tools designed to automate infrastructure workflows. Rose breaks down how these agents handle "controlled autonomy," managing high-probability tasks like QA inspections and commercial approvals while bringing humans into the loop only when risks exceed defined tolerances. From reducing design deltas to integrating robotics and physical AI, the discussion underscores how digital workflows and agentic strategies are moving autonomous industries from vision to high-velocity production.

In this interview from MWC Barcelona 2026, Eoin Coughlan, global chief technology officer industry lead of IBM, and Fran Heeran, vice president of global telecommunication at Red Hat, join theCUBE’s John Furrier and Dave Vellante to discuss the acceleration of AI convergence within the telco industry. The guests break down the massive opportunity at the edge, explaining why telecommunications providers are perfectly positioned to host private AI workloads and "AI factories" for the enterprise market. Heeran and Coughlan highlight the transition from using AI for internal network optimization to developing new monetization strategies through distributed computing and AI-powered radio access networks (RAN).

The discussion also explores the critical role of sovereign digital strategies and the emergence of agentic AI in shaping modern telco architecture. From the "far edge" to federated edge agreements, the experts examine how data integrity, security and low-latency requirements are driving the shift toward a more disaggregated, cloud-native infrastructure. Finally, the conversation looks ahead to the impact of 6G and the transformative potential of quantum computing in solving complex radio frequency and network optimization challenges.

In this interview from MWC Barcelona 2026, Jeff Aaron, vice president of product and solution marketing at HPE, joins theCUBE’s John Furrier to discuss how AI is revitalizing networking infrastructure and moving data-centric architectures to the edge. Aaron highlights how routing has evolved from simple "plumbing" into a strategic priority, enabling telecom operators to monetize new capabilities through AI factories and high-performance clustered systems. He explores the synergy between HPE and Juniper, emphasizing how the combined portfolio provides the ultra-low-latency and lossless connectivity required to maximize the value of GPUs in distributed environments.

The conversation also delves into the shift toward self-driving networks and agentic AI, focusing on how automated operations are reducing the need for manual troubleshooting and expensive "truck rolls." Aaron details new product innovations, such as the high-capacity PTX12000 router and the containerized JCNR running on ProLiant servers, which address the power and footprint constraints of modern edge sites. He further unpacks HPE’s strategic partnership with NVIDIA, illustrating how specialized routing facilitates the "scale across" and "on-ramp" use cases essential for a unified, cloud-native control plane.

In this segment from MWC Barcelona 2026, Allen Salmasi, chairman and chief executive officer of Veea Inc., and Cole Crawford, founder and chief executive officer of SynaptiQ Global, join theCUBE’s John Furrier to unpack the transition toward a hyper-converged, AI-native edge. The guests explore how the fusion of wireline and wireless networking is enabling sovereign edge AI factories and shifting the telecommunications focus from basic connectivity to sophisticated service monetization. They analyze the move from distributed to disaggregated infrastructure, highlighting the need for a sophisticated control plane to manage autonomous AI agents and complex orchestration layers.

The discussion also delves into practical deployments and the future of connectivity, including Veea’s recent launch of a hyper-converged edge solution in Mexico that integrates 5G broadband with embedded cybersecurity. Crawford details how virtualizing the radio access network (RAN) can drastically reduce CapEx while creating new revenue streams through a futures market for edge resources. Looking toward the horizon of 6G, the experts preview the role of quantum RF in providing unprecedented timing accuracy and security for the next generation of physical AI and global infrastructure.