It didn't have to end this way. With all of the resources available at Cisco, its collapse was not inevitable.
Was it simply incompetence, or a combination of hubris and self-dealing that ki---d the company?
41 replies (most recent on top)
OMG! I had almost forgotten about Umi. I still chuckle when I think about Marthin Debeer describing his organization as Cisco's innovation arm.
Cisco didn't clear a nickel from anything that was developed by Marthin.
Oh yes Umi!! This goes to show how ridiculously clueless Chambers really was. Trying to enter the consumer market with lame products my grandma wouldn't have bought. Zero market research, just arrogance and ignorance in charge. Flip, Cius, Umi, Kiss, Linksys. Every single one failed miserably.
@5ket+1fcuZpZB
Thanks for remembering us about:
- Flip camera
- Cius tablet
Now, let’s all write our memories about the mother of all consumer electronics b-$hit ever done by cisco:
CISCO ŪMI
"I think Meraki has it right to focus on user experience (GUI) first and hardware secondary."
Todd "Harvey two-face" Nightingale keeps comparing everything to Meraki. IP routing? Data Center switching? Entreprise networking? Cloud Networking? Kubernetes? Campus switching? SD-WAN? Merakize the heck out of them all! Three buttons in a SaaS user interface ought to do the trick for everything! Except he seems to forget not everything is about managing a bunch of one-trick poney wifi antennas. Hey Todd if you're reading this, here's something that comes to mind: when you all you have a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail.
It's hard to believe anyone is getting promoted to Fellow at Cisco given the lack of innovation and industry leadership.
I guess it's now the equivalent of everyone gets a trophy.
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/858877/000085887718000015/exhibit102martinezoffertra.htm
That will pay for a lot of plus-size pantsuits.
"Silicone"? Really?
Nothing you say has any weight when you can't even spell the terms correctly.
Presentation matters.
Actually Cisco has flip-flopped for the last 10+ years on ASICs. Custom silicone, then merchant, then custom, then merchant, now SiliconOne. The current wave of products like Nexus and Catalyst are back to custom silicon. Meraki is merchant, and even hardware system design is outsourced. There is not a clear idea on direction. Whereas Arista and others do all Broadcom/Intel - and ride that train for better or worse. Do customers really care about the switch silicone anymore? I think Meraki has it right to focus on user experience (GUI) first and hardware secondary.
Cisco became a technology has-been as soon as they gave up on ASICs and gave in to Broadcom.
On whose watch did that happen?
Chambers did a masterful job of riding the Internet wave. There's no question that his leadership was crucial to Cisco's success during that period.
Once the Internet was built, it became obvious that he was a one-trick pony. He and his senior leadership had no idea what was next. As was said earlier, it was so bad that they tried to outsource their brains via Boards and Councils which was the train wreck that started the company's decline from one of the most influential companies of the time to a technology has-been.
"Let us know the cloud moves that JC missed?"
That clown missed so many moves and made so many poor investments it makes me wonder whether he's blind. Cisco could very well have built their own cost-efficient servers to power a Cisco-cloud back in the days. Imagine a barebone cost-optimized UCS ready to operate in a fully automated environment. It really wasn't rocket science. Heck, even Oracle managed to build a cloud! But noooo .. out of fear of rubbing Cisco SP customers against the grain, Uncle John decided not to decide and let the cloud pass him by. In a series of violently clueless moves, Uncle John bought Flip when smart phones were already a thing. He then acquired Kiss Technology, then Linksys - all wasted down the drain. He even had Cisco build its own useless Cius tablet using a processor Google warned Cisco not to pursue with. Uncle John was a textbook demonstration of Peter's Principle.
JC [...] logic, More video traffic = higher bandwidth = more router/switches sales.
Forest = Emergence of cloud and it's security
Trees = focus on video & faster routers
Let us know the cloud moves that JC missed? Big clouds build their own servers and switches, or get them from lowest-cost bidders. Operate at scale and redundancy, so lowest cost == race to the bottom == no margins.
What would you do? Pitch N5K and UCS? Give me a break.
Enterprise / SP is where the money is. Cloud is a lost cause for hardware.
"If I gave you a nice fat $17M sign-in bonus before you demonstrated any value to the company, would it help with your insomnia?"
Great point about Maria. Anyone else see the 2018 10k Annual report filing when Maria joined the company and got "$77,884.62" relocation bonus for moving. Now get this, it was for moving from San Jose to San Jose. I kid you not. This is a small example of the corruption of the ELT and how they just siphon as much wealth from the company as they can.
See it here:
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/858877/000085887718000015/exhibit102martinezoffertra.htm
Can anybody share any action taken by my favourite Brian Palm-a-face?
@iul+1fcuZpZB 👏 Bravo, that was amazing. I know “the snake”; have engaged him many times with customers. I’d imagine you’re a SJC veteran. Maybe an ex-EN TSA 🤔
“Frog face” - I almost choked 🤣 It’s funny ‘cause it’s true.
@2pto+1fcuZpZB that’s Extreme not Cisco
Cisco is the official sponsor of Super Bowl LVI. Did you folks not see the commercial about how Cisco switches/routers/security run the behind-the-scenes show?
Basically, without Cisco there can't be Super Bowl.
The fairy tale has been supported by senior Cisco executives for decades. Does anyone remember Inder Sudhu's book "Doing Both"?
"Innovate for the future or optimize the present? Reach new markets or build existing ones? Don't choose. Don't settle. Do both."
Hahahahahahahahaha!
"Any grade 8 engineer that talked to Warrior knew she had no technical ability."
You are looking at it from a grunt employee perspective. JC doesn't want executives that will challenge or compete with him. It's all about obtaining power, she was never a threat.
Competition is for low-level employees.
Is there anyone in Cisco's senior leadership that actually understands the ship is sinking? Unfortunately, there are only two options. They're either actively supporting the fairy tale because it pays well - sc--w the employees, or they're too d-mb to know how bad things really are.
The demise of Cisco is it's wokeness and ridiculous vaccine policies. While our customers and competitors (with our partners) are hosting live events and kicking our a-s. Meanwhile back at Cisco we have yoga, meditation, mental health days and they teach us why we are all racists. Drop all this nonsense Cisco, focus on the da-n business you're in and quit playing politics, psychologist and activist.
JC was video focused. (Telepresence and even bought flip.. when apple just came with iPhone back then!!)
His logic, More video traffic = higher bandwidth = more router/switches sales.
There was some truth in that logic.. but it's a classic move of - missing the forest for the trees.
Forest = Emergence of cloud and it's security
Trees = focus on video & faster routers
As they say, rest is history, public cloud and SaaS companies grew more relevant and faster than Cisco!
With all the millions in compensation and access to industry advisors, none of his execs nor JC, could catch the "industry transitions" which they used to talk all the time during company wide meetings! It's sad to see once a darling of tech in 90s and early 2000s is now living on past glory!
"How can they sleep at night?"
If I gave you a nice fat $17M sign-in bonus before you demonstrated any value to the company, would it help with your insomnia?
It does take a unique person to preen on the ELT, collect a big paycheck, and ignore the obvious death spiral that the company is now in. How can they sleep at night?
Chambers' hire of Padma Warrior, as the Cisco CTO, from the ashes of Motorola was the perfect example of a CEO in the tech industry that was in way over his head.
Any grade 8 engineer that talked to Warrior knew she had no technical ability. The fact that she could make it through Chambers' interview process told the entire technical community that he had no idea what he was doing.
Their offspring will remember them every time they draw funds from their trust funds.
It's sweet money that they did not have to work for. You did all the work though.
The leaders don't care about results or how they are remembered. Most have absolutely zero empathy, and would be classified as psychopaths. It takes a special type of person to manipulate and deceive on a daily basis for decades.
I'm no fanboy of his but Chambers at least had some charisma and some industry gravitas unlike the current ELT. Chuck who???? Despite his faults, JC motivated and engaged his staff and did come out with some key innovations on his watch like someone said earlier. He was well known in the wider IT industry and was respected. His critical (and ultimately fatal) error was to miss the transition to cloud, software and applications with the importance of security underpinning it all. He totally missed it or would not allow Cisco to be taken in that direction, at that time when it needed to be. It was a massive blunder.
That is how Cisco will be remembered.
Short answer, they won’t. Who remembers the leadership at Nortel, unless you worked there?
The best Cisco can hope for is an MBA case study on how not to do it.
Remember the slides we used to have that were timelines of all the stuff Cisco invented and took to standards by all the DE's and engineering fellows such as FB???? Those slides seems to have stopped, around the time Chuck became CEO. And what ever happened to all the DE's and fellows? They were people to look up to. Now???? When did Cisco last come out with something truly revolutionary such as PoE, ACI, UCS or Trustsec???? A decade ago? Everything since then is a retread of existing methods/ideas.
The long post below aces the issue: a culture of sycophantic cult worship, reminiscent of North Korea has developed around the leaders and mid-management upwards panders to them. As a result a rot has set into the rank and file with the constantly changing "flavour of the month" priorities. Lack of engineering understanding and resourcing by those in power to make the changes. They are used car salesmen/women with no understanding of what it takes to make great products as Steve Jobs once famously said:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfeWhYj5zkQ
^^^Cisco^^^
@iul+1fcuZpZB damn that's impressive insider knowledge. You forgot to mention a tasty character in the story. CTO Padma Warrior comes to mind. She was as useful as a labrador in the cockpit of a 747.
As Chambers rolled out his flaming dumpster fire known as the Boards and Councils, it became abundantly clear that there were no longer any senior leaders in the company that had a clue as to the needs of Cisco's customers. They'd effectively tried to outsource their decision-making to the rank and file without the requisite funding required to actually accomplish anything.
That was the moment that it became crystal clear that the goal of the ELT was now simply to fill its pockets for as long as possible. There was no chance that Cisco was going to create a second growth phase with new, customer-centric innovation. Despite the significant efforts of many good people still in the company at the time, Chambers just didn't have the ability to lead through the coming industry transitions despite the fact that he often patted himself on the back for "leading" them.
As the Boards and Councils died, it was completely obvious to the remaining talent that, to get their ideas to market, they were going to have to leave Cisco. There were just too many people surrounding Chambers that were entirely focused on managing up and receiving John's approval - for which they were rewarded with big paychecks. It was the biggest "Emperor has no clothes" moment that I'd ever seen in my career. The good people left in droves. Cisco has never recovered.
Awesome post. Hopefully TheLayoff doesn’t yank it, like they seem to do for anything remotely informative.
No, go on, stop dancing around the handbags and tell us how you really feel.
@iul+1fcuZpZB now do Eric K.
@dcj+1fcuZpZB - I hear ya and you're certainly entitled to your opinions. I agree Cisco is not the company it used to be (I joined in'95). But instead of stewing and ranting about your bitterness on this forum, why don't you just leave Cisco? Based on your tenured knowledge, I'm guessing you're an old-timer at Cisco (just like me) so you might find age discrimination in the job market (just as I have) - especially if you're in Silicon Valley. Perhaps you should consider cashing-in your RSUs and retire altogether. I have found the grass is not always greener on the other side, but according to many on this forum it is. LIfe is too short to be miserable and carry so much bitterness. Good luck to you!
@wnq+1fcuZpZB - Yes you could say bitter. My view is that the company most of us grew with has just been really fu---d by some incomptent people at every level. Everyone cares about themselves, collect the money and then go to sleep at the end of the day - How could these people do that knowingly that they are not producing anything to take the company forward?
No one talks innovation, all try to sn---h others idea and work. I have tried enough and will leave dis-heartened despite of many efforts to rally the troops for a change.
Long winded but well written rant from the author who knows everyone's name including mob-like nicknames. You should be an OpEd journalist! That being said, my question to you is: bitter much?
Used car salesmen skilled at selling legacy network equipment. When the IT industry transitioned into software, cloud, and security... we completely missed the boat
Now the leaders are focused on distracting wall street & employees with social justice initiatives and buzzwords.
Oh Chambers is largely incompetent. He's had no successes since his forced departure from Cisco despite having accumulated enormous amounts of dollars. Complete to---r.