Cisco Systems announced on June 2 the launch of Cloud Control, a new family of software tools intended to allow companies and government agencies to create, deploy and manage AI agents that protect their IT infrastructure.
The offering is aimed at organizations that need automated, machine-scale responses to cybersecurity incidents, according to Cisco executives. The company said the platform is designed for agents that can monitor systems, block intrusions and remove attackers among other defensive functions.
Cisco positioned the product as a response to an emerging dynamic in which cyber threats increasingly take the form of coordinated AI agents acting on behalf of human hackers. "You can no longer do things at human scale," DJ Sampath, senior vice president and general manager of AI software and platform at Cisco, said. "It has to be machine scale, from an operational perspective."
The announcement comes as Anthropic prepares to release its Mythos model in the coming weeks - a development that some experts fear could enable more sophisticated attacks if misused. Cisco officials framed Cloud Control as a way for defenders to match that operational scale.
To accelerate the creation of defender agents, Cisco said customers will likely rely on AI-powered coding tools. Cisco is launching an app-store-style marketplace for third-party tools that will sit alongside Cloud Control, with OpenAI's Codex named as the initial coding tool to be embedded directly in the platform.
On the question of commercial terms, Sampath acknowledged Cisco will take a percentage of sales made through the platform but said the exact cut has not been set. "We’re working through the economics. You should expect that we will have some economics that favor us, because it costs non-trivial amounts to be able to leverage all of these pieces," he said.
Cisco said Cloud Control is available in North America as of Tuesday. The marketplace for third-party tools, including the Codex integration, is scheduled to arrive in the second half of 2026.
Context and implications
Cloud Control is presented as a tooling layer for organizations seeking automated defense capabilities. The product bundles agent creation and lifecycle management alongside a forthcoming ecosystem of coding and integration tools intended to speed deployment.
At launch the software will be limited to North American availability, with the broader marketplace phase rolling out later next year.