News

Feb 20, 2026

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Cisco and AT&T have expanded their partnership to offer IoT and private network services via a dedicated 5G backbone that supports ultra-low latency, high speeds, security, and simplified management.

Specifically, Cisco will integrate its Mobility Services Platform, IoT Control Center, and Converged Core products with AT&T’s 5G Standalone service. The AT&T service, like other standalone offerings from Verizon or T-Mobile, is what the carrier calls a true 5G core, meaning it doesn’t rely on older 4G LTE infrastructure to deliver 5G services. It includes features such as the ability to support dedicated bandwidth to specific application workloads and to identify traffic types to let businesses apply policies more easily.

Cisco’s Mobility Services platform includes a full-stack, cloud-native converged core network and distributed edge support. It’s designed to simplify how service providers and businesses build, manage, and deliver new mobile services globally, Cisco says.

The integrated AT&T/Cisco service lets customers buy dedicated virtual slices to guarantee bandwidth and latency, for example. Customers can use this feature to separate traffic for critical IoT workloads from other traffic to ensure delivery, Cisco says. In addition, the service will enable enterprises to support IoT operations and applications with optimized local performance as well as to more efficiently support IoT lifecycle management, diagnostics, and automation, according to Cisco.

Other carriers—including Verizon, T-Mobile, and Vodaphone—also offer 5G standalone services for enterprise applications such as IoT, edge computing, and industrial automation .

Cisco and AT&T have partnered in the past to provide customers with SASE services, 5G Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) gateways, and other business connectivity products.

by Michael Cooney

Senior Editor

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Michael is a senior editor with Network World focused on deciphering the strategies of many core high-tech vendors such as Cisco, Arista, Juniper, HPE and IBM. Michael has been writing about the industry for more than 33 years and has won coverage awards from ASBPE and FOLIO. He has a BA in Journalism and Technical Writing Certificate from The Pennsylvania State University.

He can be reached at michael_cooney@foundryco.com.