Failure after failure

Cisco seems to be a sinking ship. Nothing the ELT does seems to make things better.

In the mid-to-late 2000's, the (then) Global Government Solutions Group produced a customized version of standard Cisco gear that included US non-export encryption technology that it was going to sell to the US Government and/or Department of Defense. Just as the initial development was completed, management decided to halt the program and not sell any hardware to a customer because they'd have to support the hardware for 5 yrs after the sale of the last unit sold and there wasn't enough demand to justify the support costs. Total waste of money to produce something you can't or won't sell.

Then Cisco buys Flip camera for $590 million and shuts it down instead of selling it off.

Then, the Global Government Solutions Group again tries to develop a product that won't or can't sell. Given the costs of building/expanding data centers, someone had the idea to customize shipping containers to handle power & cooling and put server racks in them. They even built out a proof of concept, poured a concrete pad and built a brick wall around it to hide the container and cooling systems. Now that spot is just a empty hole with an unused cooling system doing nothing.

Cisco purchased Scientific Atlanta for $6.9 billion and then sells it off for $550 million. Boy, did Cisco really screw that one up. A $6 billion dollar loss. Did they even make $6 billion off it while they had it?

The failures are getting closer together and costing more. The way Cisco is hemorrhaging talent but retaining the same execs that are making these decisions is baffling.

What's next?

Comment! It's anonymous!

7 replies (most recent on top)

even google under ruth porat is cutting the cash flow and canning their science projects.

https://sputniknews.com/business/201701181049702490-google-moonshot-projects-cut/

I don't understand why you stay there if you're so unhappy? If the place s---s , then leave. The Cisco bashing blog is a weird phenomenon. As is the psychological state of people who stay there. I used to work at Cisco and it was not a good place, so I left.

If you left voluntarily, why do you follow this forum?

I try not to complain, but the ELT has a responsibility to me as a shareholder to do what's best for the company. Buying products/companies and then shutting them down instead of recouping the cost, or selling them for a tenth of what they paid for them is not financially responsible. And if the product has become so bad that you can't sell it for more than a tenth of what you paid for it, then you're not doing your job as a leader of the company by either ruining a product or way over valuing it and paying too much for it. As to why I keep my stock, as long as Cisco pays a dividend and the stock price is above what I paid for it, why shouldn't I keep it to collect the dividends? When the dividends end, or the stock price starts to slide, I'll dump it.

But yes, there's a lot of unnecessary negativity and outright trolling on this site too. I try to ignore the trolls and/or spiteful/hateful comments & posts. The one about "Real hope and change..." is a perfect example of a thread that's just a pure waste of time.

I don't understand why you stay there if you're so unhappy? If the place s---s , then leave. The Cisco bashing blog is a weird phenomenon. As is the psychological state of people who stay there. I used to work at Cisco and it was not a good place, so I left.

So, I don't complain about the bad things, or about others and have no ill will toward others. I think that is healthier attitude. The bitterness and venom here only injures those who wallow in it.

B--chy & Cranky = Inclusion and Diversity.

How can we forget NDS and damage that was caused by it's takeover to CISCO ?

Maybe the ELT will approach MPLS to get them to build something. Too bad they're a hardware team and the industry is focused on software.

Cisco is a collection of sales people, engineers, and a few bean counters in finance. No one with any business or portfolio management experience, as far as I can tell. Until they fix that, the downward spiral will continue.

Thread regarding Cisco Systems Inc. layoffs

Failure after failure

7 replies (most recent on top)

Post a reply