Connect. Secure. Manage.
Cisco ACI
Plan and operate Cisco ACI fabrics with application-focused policy, explicit external connectivity and a practical migration and support model.
Devices supported
across the UK
Client locations
supported
Traffic handled
at peak time
Average
response time
Average response is not a resolution time or a contractual guarantee. Support scope and response commitments are agreed for each engagement.
Cisco ACI manages a data-centre fabric and the rules that control traffic through it. Those rules need to reflect how your apps work. We help you assess, build, migrate and support ACI, with clear ownership of access and changes. The design also covers faults and the skills your team needs to run it.
Workload-led design
Start with application, compute and storage dependencies rather than the switch model.
Clear failure domains
Understand which links, devices and sites can fail together.
Operational clarity
Make fabrics, external routing and management responsibilities supportable.
Decide whether ACI fits the environment
We start with the customer’s workload, segmentation and support needs. ACI can be appropriate for organisations seeking consistent policy across a supported fabric. But it is not a mandatory replacement for every traditional network. We compare it with suitable alternatives, including NX-OS and VXLAN EVPN designs, and explain the differences in management and engineering responsibility.
The assessment includes the current hardware, virtualisation platforms, external routing and security services. It also considers the team’s experience and capacity to operate the chosen model. A technically capable fabric can still be difficult to maintain if app ownership is unclear or every change depends on an undocumented exception. Those readiness issues are addressed before rollout is treated as the obvious next step.
Standards & partnerships
Confidence in the team behind your network.
Cisco Partner
Cisco Meraki
Cyber Essentials
Cyber Essentials PlusMCI Network Services is operated by Proxar Ltd. Certifications apply to the certified legal entity and the scope of its certificates. View accreditation information
Translate applications into a manageable policy model
Tenants, routing contexts, bridge domains, endpoint groups and contracts need consistent meaning within the customer’s design. We agree how these objects map to apps and admin boundaries rather than creating names without an ownership model. A policy structure should be understandable when a new service is requested and when an engineer investigates a fault months later.
The design distinguishes network reachability from permitted communication. An endpoint being learned by the fabric does not prove that its app should reach every other endpoint. We set out required flows and shared services, then review the relevant policy controls. Broad exceptions are documented and justified instead of being used to make initial tests pass while undermining the intended segmentation.
A useful starting point
Not sure where to start?
Bring the requirement. We will help you define the engineering work.
Plan the fabric and its external dependencies
Leaf and spine roles, controller placement, capacity and failure domains are considered alongside physical constraints. We check supported hardware, software and feature combinations for the proposed estate. The design accounts for growth and maintenance, not just the first set of connected servers. Management access and recovery arrangements are included before production workloads depend on the fabric.
External network access receives equal attention. L3Out routing, firewall integration and connections to other data centres determine how apps reach services beyond ACI. We set out route ownership, permitted advertisements and the expected return paths. A healthy internal fabric cannot compensate for an unclear border design or an upstream security dependency that has not been included in the availability plan.
Different environments. The same care.
Built around the work
your network supports.
Finance, banking and the wider private sector. We start with the systems and people that depend on your connections.
Finance & banking
Market-data paths, routing and provider coordination on clients’ behalf.
Financial-market services ↗Offices & multi-site teams
Reliable access between people, workplaces and business applications.
Office network design ↗Data centres & cloud
Network boundaries, workload connections and operational ownership.
Data centre networks ↗Introduce the platform through controlled stages
Deployment follows an approved setup and acceptance plan. We check fabric discovery, controller health, infrastructure policy and a limited set of tenant services before expanding the scope. Integrations with virtualisation or management platforms are checked against their supported versions and access needs. Discovery alone is not treated as proof that setup ownership has been transferred safely.
For migrations, coexistence and gateway movement are planned app by app. Temporary Layer 2 extensions, route exchange and policy exceptions need clear boundaries and removal criteria. The customer should know which workloads have moved, which remain on the old network and how rollback would work at each stage. This reduces the risk of a partially migrated setup becoming an unplanned permanent design.
Validate service behaviour and operational readiness
Acceptance includes representative app flows, denied paths and agreed failure scenarios. We check endpoint state, contracts, external routing and the app owner’s observations together. A green fabric health indicator is useful context but does not replace service testing. Untested conditions are recorded so that the handover does not overstate what has been shown.
Operations teams need practical procedures for adding endpoints, changing policy, investigating faults and maintaining the platform. We provide records and knowledge transfer tied to the delivered setup. Configuration protection, monitoring and escalation duties are agreed clearly. Any ongoing support arrangement states its coverage and limits rather than relying on the assumption that a rollout project includes indefinite service ownership.
Choose the appropriate engagement
MCI can provide ACI fabric design, rollout, migration assistance or investigation of a current policy and forwarding problem. We can also work alongside an internal team that retains day-to-day control. The scope identifies the decisions, changes and acceptance evidence included, together with the participation required from server, security and app owners.
Our Cisco and Meraki network services support organisations throughout the UK, with specialist Cisco data-centre work scoped to the actual estate. To begin an ACI discussion, provide the current topology, platforms and business aim. We will identify the prerequisites and engineering approach needed before recommending a production change or making claims about the benefits your setup can achieve.
Talk to a specialist
What does your network need next?
Tell us what you are planning, changing or trying to improve. We will help define a practical next step and the engineering scope.
+44 203 196 6566Choose option 1
sales@proxar.co.ukUK-wide service.
Most of our engineers are based in Kent, with a focus on London, Sussex, Essex and Berkshire.
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