Cisco beyond routers and switches

True blue tech enthusiasts are impressed with speed, power, and connectivity – that is, workflow at a speed of a bullet, power that last 24/7, and gadgets that can communicate with all other gadgets.

That unassuming black box called a router is a jewel because it interconnects computers and facilitates the movement of data, voice and video across the network.

That other geeky object called the switch is in the heart because it is used to build local area networks, metropolitan area networks and wide area networks that connect buildings, cities and countries.

Without the router and the switch, none of today’s collaborative technologies for the Internet would have been possible.

But the humble router and switch are faceless, meaningless objects to non-geeks. And the world’s leading manufacturer of these networking products remain very much in the background, a hardworking backstage worker that plays supporting role to the stellar cast of software and hardware stars – think Microsoft, Intel, IBM, Nokia, and a whole lot of other tech superstars – whose impact on consumers is more direct, more immediate.

But if Cisco’s plan of bringing networking and communications technology to the forefront of the tech consumer landscape pans out, Cisco would be a household name, not just a brand and an icon for tech geniuses.

"The face of networking is changing," says Luichi Robles, country manager of Cisco Systems, in a press conference. "It is more than the physical network alone; today, it is about the power of the human network."

Cisco everywhere

The average Internet user would affirm that the Web game has changed tremendously in the last two years. Beyond e-mail, online surfing, research and shopping, the uses of the World Wide Web has so evolved that it has become the mecca for collaboration and sharing not just data but music, videos, photos, blogs and a whole lot of other things that people care about, and concerns themselves and other people close to them.

Think Flickr, YouTube, MySpace, Cyworld, Skype and other immensely popular collaborative sites and you wouldn’t view the Web in the same way. Instead of media or Internet companies creating and distributing content to a worldwide audience, it is now the consumers that are generating content and spreading them to a mass audience.

The "you" in YouTube, the "i" in Flickr, the "my" in MySpace actually speak volumes of the "me" generation that inhabits the new Web – ordinary people emerging in the limelight and taking notice of what other ordinary people are doing with their lives.

No, the Internet didn’t kill the real media superstars; it has only created more stars.

This "people" or "human" network, according to Robles, is what is driving Cisco to position itself in the consumer space. After all, Cisco has been driving most of the technologies that power the new Web.

"Our focus is on revealing our role in the markets because at the end of the day we are all end-users who use the network – on the road, at home, at work," says Robles.

Unknown to many, Cisco’s technology products also comprise home networking products, which enable users to share Internet access, printers, music, movies and games; IP telephony products for transmitting voice communications; optical networking products, which provide a path for telecommunications carriers; and storage networking products.

For two decades, Cisco has played a major role in driving Internet Protocol to become the fundamental infrastructure in networking and helped invent Voice Over IP (VoIP) and bring it over to the enterprise and eventually the consumer market.

Robles says that Cisco may not be a household name at the moment, but it is definitely "there."

Cisco the brand

Now that the end-user is in charge, creating collaborative websites and blogs, mixing content and having more of a say in how companies will do business with them, Robles says it is an ideal opportunity for Cisco to continue to build the platform for people.

But the focus now is more of using networking technology for "transforming life" rather than for mere connectivity.

"In the 1990s, the goal is to get connected, to be able to do business online. The center is the enterprise and it is all about the power of the physical network," Robles says. "What we are seeing today is a total reversal; consumers are driving the innovation and what matters is the power of the human network."

This market inflection point, according to Robles, is driving the company’s $100-million branding campaign.

In a press conference attended by IT journalists in the country, Cisco unveiled a new logo, which company executives say "aims to preserve the company’s heritage while expressing a broader company position and appealing to a wider audience."

It has also announced that it will be launching interactive media such as online community websites, social networks, billboards and product placements to reach a broader segment of the consumer market.

"Cisco is no longer equated with just networking purely in terms of routers and switches. Our business has become much more expansive as we span networking into voice, video, storage and consumer areas across four major market segments," Robles says.

Eric Sulit, Cisco’s channels and marketing manager, explains that building Cisco’s brand value has been at the forefront of Cisco’s strategy.

In fact, he adds, Cisco’s latest acquisitions – Linksys and Scientific Atlanta, in particular – are geared toward the home.

While it may take years for Cisco to really introduce a real consumer product for the home, it is definitely moving into that direction.

Cisco’s new videoconferencing package called the Cisco TelePresence, launched in Singapore last month, may yet be a revolutionary tool at home for communicating with members of the family residing outside the country. This is in addition to the IP phones that Cisco has been building over the years with the help of the academe such as its research partnership with the Nanyang Polytechnic in Singapore.

As the dynamics of "media" and the top-down approach of doing business online as we know it have been toppled over like a house of straw almost overnight, it helps to think that it’s not the "big bad wolf" that blew the house down but rather the Internet’s second wind that is ushering all the changes.

And at the heart of this is Cisco poised to take advantage of what the Internet’s future may offer.