NB577: Cisco Brings SONiC to N9000 Switches; Broadcom Debuts Wi-Fi 8 SoCs for Consumer Routers

The episode opens with a Red Alert highlighting 2,021 new CVEs in the week ending May 29th, with particular concern over SCADA-BR, an open-source SCADA controller widely used in OT/manufacturing environments. CVE-2026-9645 scored 9.9 and allows authenticated users to execute arbitrary JavaScript with root privileges. Discovered by Tenable, the vulnerability has no fix and no active maintainers, prompting the hosts to advise users to migrate away from the platform immediately.

Forward Networks announced 'Forward Predict,' a new capability allowing network engineers to test proposed changes against a mathematical digital twin of their production network. The tool supports changes to routing, firewall rules, NAT, ACLs, and segmentation. The hosts noted the potential for AIOps integration, where AI agent-suggested fixes could be validated in the digital twin before production deployment, though they cautioned about the inevitable delta between twin and actual network state.

Cisco and Cumulo announced a cloud bursting solution called Bridged Cloud, designed to transparently extend on-premises flash-based file storage into cloud backends (AWS, Azure, Google, Oracle) to handle capacity spikes without application refactoring or user-noticeable latency degradation. The hosts framed this as particularly timely given soaring flash memory prices.

NetBrain added new capabilities to its AI agents, Deep Diagnosis and Runbook Companion, including AI Path Doctor for validating network paths, Dynatrace integration for mapping application-network dependencies, MCP support for ServiceNow, and compatibility with third-party LLMs like Claude, Gemini, and GPT.

IBM announced Project Lightwell, a subscription-based clearinghouse for open-source software vulnerabilities and validated patches, backed by a pledged $5 billion investment and 20,000 engineers. Early customers include Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan Chase, Visa, and Mastercard. The hosts were skeptical about the scale of the commitment versus press release verbiage, questioned whether upstream contribution would undermine the subscription model's value proposition, and noted IBM appears to be capitalizing on fears around AI-driven vulnerability proliferation.

Broadcom expanded its pre-ratification Wi-Fi 8 portfolio with three new SoCs (BCM6, 774, and 776) targeting high-performance Ethernet routers and mesh networking. The chips feature quad-core CPUs, dedicated network processors, power amplifiers, and digital pre-distortion in compact 15x15mm and 19x19mm form factors, now available for early access sampling.

Cisco announced it is extending SONiC NOS support to its enterprise-focused Nexus 9000 series, powered by Cisco Silicon One and CloudScale ASICs supporting up to 800G speeds. The move targets enterprise AI data centers and supports two SONiC distributions: a build-your-own and a pre-validated version. Management can be handled via Nexus Hyperfabric. The hosts debated whether enterprises are sophisticated enough to want SONiC but would still buy Cisco rather than go white-box.

EuroOffice, a European web-based collaborative document editing platform forked from OnlyOffice, is set to launch in early June as an alternative to Microsoft Office and Google Docs. The hosts noted the lack of a credible European alternative to Microsoft Teams as a significant gap in European tech sovereignty efforts.

Dell reported Q1 fiscal 2027 results with $43.8 billion in revenue, up 88% year-over-year, driven by record AI-optimized server revenues of $16 billion, up 757%. The hosts noted these results are as impressive as NVIDIA's but received less media attention because GPU narratives dominate current tech coverage.

In space networking news, the U.S. Space Force awarded SpaceX a $2.29 billion contract to build a low-Earth orbit satellite communications network as part of its Space Data Network Backbone program. The hosts flagged concerns about SpaceX's negotiating leverage, citing a Reuters report of SpaceX demanding higher payments from the Pentagon for Starlink used with military drones. Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket exploded during a pre-launch static engine test on May 28th, with no casualties and no Amazon satellites onboard. SpaceX's Starship Flight 13 was grounded by the FAA pending investigation of engine failures during Flight 12. The hosts contrasted these private sector mishaps with NASA's flawless Artemis II mission.