[CISCO SYSTEMS] November 1, 2011

Introduction:
Cisco, founded in 1984, was originally a switch and router company supplying its products for networks. During the 1980s it competed directly with Bay Networks and 3Com. Its work in helping to develop TCP/IP networks and the Internet has made it the leader in network infrastructure -- hardware, software and services. Cisco Systems, Inc. is an American multinational corporation headquartered in California, United States. It excels in designing and selling consumer electronics, networking, voice, and communications technology and services. Cisco has more than 70,000 employees and annual revenue of US$ 40.0 billion as of 2010. The stock was added to the Dow Jones stock index on June 8, 2009, and is also included in the S&P 500 index, the Russell 100 index, NASDAQ 100 index and Russell 1000 Stock index.

The corporate time-line:

Early years of Cisco Systems Inc.: (1984 1990) Len Bosack and Sandy Lerner, along with Richard Troiano were the founders of Cisco Systems in 1984. The name "Cisco" was derived from the city name, San Francisco. One of the earliest products of Cisco was namely; Bosack, a multiple protocol router. The company's first CEO was Bill Graves, who held the position from 1987 to 1988. The company went public on February 16th, 1990 and was also listed on the Nasdaq stock exchange. Routing and Ethernet switching: (1991 1995) Cisco systems were the first company to manufacture and sell one of its earliest invented routers and it went commercially successful in the real world market too. The router supported multiple network protocols. Between 1992 and 1994, Cisco has also acquired several companies in Ethernet switching are, most notably Kalpana, Grand Junction and Crescendo Communications together forming Catalyst product line. At that time, the

[CISCO SYSTEMS] November 1, 2011

company envisioned layer 3 routing layer 2 (Ethernet, Token Ring) switching as complementary functions of different intelligence and architecture the former was slow and complex, the latter was fast but simple. Internet and Silicon Intelligence: (1996 2005) As the internet protocol became widely adopted, the importance of multiprotocol routing declined. Nevertheless, Cisco managed to capitalize on the internet wave, with wide range of products that became vital to internet service providers and by 1998 gave Cisco de-facto monopoly in this critical market segment. In late March, 2000, Cisco became the most valuable company in the world, with a market capitalization of more than US $500 billion. The Human Network: (2006 Current) As part of the massive rebranding campaign of 2006, Cisco Systems adopted the new, shortened name "Cisco", a new slogan and logo that was created in collaboration with Joe Phenom Finocchiaro and Jerry The King Kuyper. The changes were meant to make Cisco a "household" brand - a strategy designed to support the low-end Linksys products and future consumer products such as Flip Video camera acquired by Cisco in 2009. Due to lower than expected profit in 2011, Cisco was forced to reduce annual expenses by $1 billion. The company cut around 3,000 employees with an early-retirement program who accepted buyout and planned to eliminate as many as 10,000 jobs (around 14% of the 73,400 total employees before curtailment).During the 2011 analyst call, Cisco's CEO John Chambers have called several competitors by name, apparently inaugurating a "black PR" campaign.

Major Acquisitions:
Cisco acquired a variety of companies to bring in products and talent into the company. In 19951996 the company completed 11 acquisitions. Several acquisitions, such as Stratacom, were the biggest deals in the industry when they occurred. During the Internet boom in 1999, the company acquired Cerent Corporation, a start-up company located in Petaluma, California, for about US$7 billion. It was the most expensive acquisition made by Cisco to date, and only the acquisition of Scientific Atlanta has been larger. Several acquired

[CISCO SYSTEMS] November 1, 2011

companies have grown into $1Bn plus business units for Cisco, including LAN switching, Enterprise Voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP) platform Webex, and home networking. The latter came as result of Cisco acquiring Linksys in 2003 and in 2010 was supplemented with new product line dubbed Cisco Valet. In the recent merger deals, Cisco bought Starent Networks (a mobile technology company) and Moto Development Group, a product design consulting firm that helped develop Cisco's Flip video camera.Also in 2010, Cisco became a key stakeholder in e-Skills Week. In March 2011, Cisco completed the acquisition of privately held network configuration and change management solutions company Pari Networks. Although many buy-ins (such as Crescendo Networks) in 1993 resulted in acquisition of flagship technology (e.g. Catalyst 6500) to Cisco, many others have failed - partially or completely. For instance, in 2010 Cisco occupied a meaningful share of the packet-optical market, revenues were still not on par with US$7 billion price tag paid in 1999 for Cerent. Some of acquired technologies (such as Pure Digital in 2010) saw their products discontinued, while others like Cisco mi are receiving significant criticism.