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Cisco Systems, Inc. (, ) is an American Multinational Corporation with 54,000 employees and annual revenue of US $ 28.48 billion as of 2006 . Headquartered in San Jose, California , it designs and sells networking and communications technology and services under four brands, namely Cisco, Linksys , WebEx and Scientific Atlanta . Initially, Cisco manufactured only enterprise multi-protocol Routers but gradually diversified its product offering to move into the home user market with technologies such as VoIP while also expanding its offering for corporate customers. CORPORATE HISTORY Len Bosack and Sandy Lerner , a married couple that worked in computer operations staff at Stanford University , founded ''Cisco Systems'' in 1984. Bosack adapted multiple- Protocol Router software originally written by William Yeager , another staff employee who had begun the work years before Bosack arrived from the University Of Pennsylvania , where Bosack had received his Bachelor's Degree . While Cisco was not the first company to develop and sell a (IP) has become a standard, the importance of multi-protocol routing as a function has declined. Today, Cisco's largest routers are marketed to route primarily IP packets and MPLS frames. In 1990 , the company went public and was listed on the Nasdaq stock exchange. Bosack and Lerner walked away from the company with $170 million and later divorced. During the Internet boom in 1999 , the company acquired Cerent Corp. , a start-up company located in Petaluma , California, for about $7 billion. It was the most expensive acquisition made by Cisco at that time. Since then, only Cisco's acquisition of Scientific-Atlanta has been bigger. In late March 2000 , at the height of the Dot-com Boom , Cisco was the most valuable company in the world, with a Market Capitalization of more than $500 billion.12 In 2007 , with a market cap of about $180 billion, it is still one of the most valuable companies.3 Using acquisitions, internal development, and partnering with other companies, Cisco has made inroads into many network equipment markets outside routing, including Ethernet switching, remote access, branch office routers, ATM networking, security, IP telephony, and others. In 2003 , Cisco acquired Linksys , a popular manufacturer of Computer Network ing Hardware and positioned it as a leading Brand for the home and end user networking market ( SOHO ). The company was a 2002-03 recipient of the Ron Brown Award . Origin of the Cisco name The name "Cisco" is an abbreviation of San Fran''cisco'' . According to John Morgridge , employee 34 and the company's former president, the founders hit on the name and logo while driving to Sacramento to register the company -- they saw the Golden Gate Bridge framed in the sunlight.4 The name cisco Systems (with the lowercase "c") continued in use within the engineering community at the company long after the official company name was changed to Cisco Systems, Inc. Users of Cisco products can still see the name cisco Systems occasionally in bug reports and IOS messages. The company's logo reflects its San Francisco name heritage: it represents a stylized Golden Gate Bridge . In October 2006, Cisco publicly launched a new logo that is graphically simpler and more stylized than the original. Shareholder class action lawsuit against Cisco While a successful company in many ways, Cisco is not without its controversies. On August 18 , 2006 Cisco reached a settlement in a long-standing class action lawsuit that originated in 2001. "The original suit, filed April 20, 2001, claimed that the company made misleading statements, or omitted statements of material fact, that were relied on by purchasers of Cisco stock. It also alleged that the individual defendants sold Cisco stock while in possession of material, non-public information. Cisco denied all allegations in the suit."5 While Cisco denies all wrongdoing in the suit, it agreed to settle with the plaintiffs. Cisco's liability insurers, its directors, and officers paid the plaintiffs $91.75 million to settle the suit.6 Cisco lawsuit against Huawei On January 23, 2003, Cisco sued Huawei Technologies, Co., Ltd and its subsidiaries, Huawei America, Inc. and FutureWei Technologies, Inc. over Huawei's unlawful copying of Cisco's intellectual property.7 The suit alleged that Huawei "unlawfully copied and misappropriated Cisco's IOS software... and infringed numerous Cisco patents." Cisco suspended the patent infringement lawsuit on October 1, 2003, after Huawei agreed to modify some of their products. CORPORATE AFFAIRS The company has its corporate headquarters in San Jose, California , and also has outposts in other countries. Cisco's vision is "Changing the Way We Live, Work, Play and Learn." Cisco's current tagline is "Welcome to the human network."8. Executives John Chambers is currently the chairman and CEO . Other senior executives include:
PRODUCTS AND SERVICES Partial list of hardware products in 1987.]]
Partial list of software products
VoIP Services Cisco became a major provider of voice over IP to enterprises, and is now moving into the home user market through its acquisitions of Scientific Atlanta and Linksys . Scientific Atlanta provides VoIP equipment to cable service providers such as Time Warner , Cablevision , Rogers Communications , UPC and others; Linksys has partnered with companies such as Skype and Yahoo to integrate consumer VoIP services with wireless and cordless phones. Training for Professionals Cisco has developed and maintains professional curriculum of courses aimed at educating people on networking technologies and Cisco products. The company offers several Cisco Career Certifications to professionals in the networking field. These certifications are attained by successfully completing exams taken at third party testing facilities. Cisco has developed and sponsors Cisco Networking Academies in 150 countries aimed at teaching students to design and maintain computer networks. CRITICISMS A recent point of controversy surrounding the company is its alleged involvement in censorship in the People's Republic of China. According to author Ethan Guttman, Cisco and other telecommunications equipment providers supplied the Chinese government with Internet infrastructure equipment that is used to block Internet websites. Cisco says that it does not customize or develop specialized or unique filtering capabilities to enable governments or regimes to block access to information and that it sells the same equipment in China as it sells worldwide.9 This controversial involvement in China was also mentioned in a recent Frontline (US documentary TV series) report. 10 See Also: Internet censorship in the People's Republic of China SEE ALSO
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