This yr’s Cisco Companion Summit 2025 was a robust reminder of what’s doable when innovation meets goal. Every year, as a part of the summit, we host a International Companion Innovation Problem — an open invitation for our companions to convey their boldest concepts and improvements to leverage expertise for good.
This yr’s submissions within the Partnering for Goal class reignited my ardour for this work. The options our companions are constructing tackle a few of at present’s most urgent challenges throughout vitality, healthcare, emergency response, and past. Collectively, we’re working towards our shared Goal of Powering an Inclusive Future for All, one innovation at a time.
Goal-driven innovation at scale
12 months after yr, our companions proceed to boost the bar, and this yr was no exception. Seventy-six of our 87 whole submissions — a powerful 86% — fell beneath the Partnering for Goal class. Moreover, 76 of the overall submissions included AI parts, displaying how companions are embracing rising expertise to maximize outcomes and influence.
What stood out this yr wasn’t simply the amount of submissions, however the ambition behind them.
It’s clear that our companions are pondering larger, tackling issues at scale, and constructing options designed for real-world influence.
Amongst so many robust submissions, I’m excited to have a good time the 4 companions who exemplify the best of purpose-driven innovation.
Get to know this yr’s Partnering for Goal winners
- KIW – This companion, primarily based in Spain, is tackling two important challenges directly with their Splid.AI platform: the rising demand for extra computing energy to run AI functions and the waste of renewable vitality because of energy grid limitations. KIW developed Splid.AI, an AI market that turns extra renewable vitality into computing energy by connecting surplus vitality producers with enterprises that want AI processing. Leveraging Cisco AI PODs, Splid.AI allows high-performance AI workloads to run precisely the place and when renewable vitality is obtainable, serving to to cut back prices and switch wasted vitality right into a priceless useful resource for AI development.
- Morgan Photo voltaic – This Canada-based companion is rethinking how buildings use and create vitality. Morgan Photo voltaic’s Power Blinds are photovoltaic window remedies that generate clear vitality whereas protecting constructing occupants snug. Constructing homeowners report seeing actual financial savings, with payback durations as brief as two years. The blinds join by Cisco Energy over Ethernet (PoE) networks and use good algorithms to regulate their place all through the day, serving to to cut back vitality consumption from heating and cooling the room. In addition they gather priceless information about warmth move and occupancy that can be utilized for constructing administration and AI functions.
- EchoStor Applied sciences – Addressing the important problem of clinician burnout and well being care workflow inefficiency, this US-based companion developed Pleasant Whisper, an AI-powered voice assistant platform constructed on Cisco expertise. The answer integrates with current hospital methods — digital well being information, labs, and monitoring gadgets — to ship real-time, context-aware affected person summaries by earpieces, headsets, or cellular apps. By turning current hospital infrastructure into an clever voice assistant for clinicians, Pleasant Whisper saves time, improves communication, and makes well being care safer for each workers and sufferers.
- Iron Bow – When emergency methods don’t work collectively, response occasions endure and lives are in danger. Iron Bow, additionally primarily based within the U.S., constructed SignalPoint to repair this downside for organizations managing complicated emergency response operations. The platform brings collectively Cisco expertise and companion emergency platforms into one unified answer that retains a number of methods in sync whereas making certain compliance with legal guidelines and rules. SignalPoint additionally offers superior location providers that may pinpoint 911 callers inside 5 meters, giving first responders the correct data they should arrive on web site shortly and save lives.
This yr’s robust engagement within the Partnering for Goal class reinforces a robust fact that doing good and doing enterprise aren’t competing priorities; they’re complementary forces that drive long-term enterprise success.
To all our companions who participated on this yr’s International Companion Innovation Problem: thanks. Your dedication to combining innovation with goal reinforces what we already know — once we leverage expertise for good, there’s no restrict to what we are able to obtain.
