The Protocol Stack AI Is Missing

S1E11 - The Protocol Stack AI Is Missing

Published: April 15, 2026

Duration: 50:59

Cisco's OutShift deployed a multi-agent network configuration system that raised error detection from 10–15% to 100% and cut full change validation from 2–3 weeks to 6–7 minutes. The reason it worked — and why most enterprise multi-agent deployments still fail — comes down to a single gap nobody is talking about: agents can connect, but they cannot think together.

Vijoy Pandey, SVP and General Manager of OutShift by Cisco, joins Matt and Sam to explain why A2A, MCP, and existing agent protocols solve connectivity but leave out an entire layer: shared cognition. OutShift's research identifies this as a missing "Layer 9" — a semantic and cognitiv...