Saturday, November 2, 2013

Cisco's Cloudy Wireless Ambitions



CEO John Chambers has made some bold statements in the press recently about Cisco's (CSCO) plan to disrupt the traditional wireless infrastructure market, which is currently primarily served by Alcatel-Lucent (ALU), Ericsson (ERIC), Huawei, and Nokia Solutions and Networks (NOK).

Cisco claims to have funded a start-up as part of this disruptive plan. I believe Cisco aims to disrupt this market via Cloud-Radio Access Network (C-RAN) technology using new software programmable processors (likely developed by the start-up it is funding). Such an entry would complement Cisco's wireless offerings in Enterprise WiFi, Small Cells and Self Optimizing Networks (SON) and, if successful, open up another multi-billion dollar market for the company. In addition, C-RAN also fits with the Software Defined Networking (SDN) model, which is an area Cisco is aggressively pursuing. As for my view on Cisco's stock, I find the current risk/reward favorable. CSCO.

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