2. annual sales to Cisco within five Leader of the Pack
years. Cisco has outgrown its network-industry rivals, but its share price has just begun to reflect its growth prospects in new markets for communications, online
Cisco CEO John Chambers collaboration and entertainment. If the company continues to win new business in these markets, its shares could grow at least 15%. The earnings
says even he is surprised by the numbers below don’t include stock-option expenses, the approach still favored by most tech companies, including Cisco, and industry analysts.
company’s early success in Market Price/5-Year
Revenues (bil) Earnings Per Share Price/Earnings
these new ventures. “We are Company Ticker
Recent 52-Week
Price Change
Value
(bil) 2006E 2007E 2006E 2007E 2006E 2007E
Earnings
Growth (E)
winning almost all the new jump
Cisco Systems* CSCO $23.90 36.6% $145.9 $28.0A $33.0 $1.10A $1.27 21.7 18.9 1.4
balls,” he says. “We will become Alcatel ALA 12.20 -6.7 17.4 18.0 19.0 0.72 0.87 17.0 14.1 1.4
the leading company as the net- Juniper Systems JNPR 18.20 -17.6 10.3 2.3 2.6 0.75 0.88 24.4 20.6 1.4
work enables all forms of com- Nortel Networks NT 2.18 -34.1 9.5 11.0 12.0 0.03 0.14 77.9 16.1 9.7
munication.” Redback Networks RBAK 14.71 51.5 1.0 0.3 0.3 0.38 0.64 38.5 23.1 1.7
In appreciation of these Avaya** AV 12.06 9.9 5.5 5.1 5.4 0.46 0.60 26.0 20.0 2.6
prospects, analysts have been Polycom PLCM 25.75 61.1 2.3 0.7 0.7 0.99 1.18 26.0 21.8 1.7
raising their sales growth fore- A=Actual E=Estimated *Fiscal year ends in July. **Fiscal year ends in Sept. Source: Thomson Financial/Baseline
casts for Cisco from the low
Emerging Opportunity Heading Higher Fatter Pipes, Fatter Profits
teens to 15% or more per year. In coming years Cisco expects to double Cisco’s shares, which went nowhere for five Growing demand for Internet video services
As for profits-which totaled $6.8 its sales in emerging markets, chiefly in years, have rallied 40% in recent weeks, will force providers to upgrade and enlarge
oil-rich nations wiring their populations suggesting investors believe in the company’s their networks. That’s good news for Cisco,
billion, or $1.10 a share in the to create jobs and improve health care. improved growth prospects. the leading supplier of routers and switches.
fiscal year ended July 2006-the
Street sees $1.27 a share in fis- FY 2006 Revenue By Region (bil) Cisco Systems (CSCO - NNM) Data Demand Per Home
cal ’07, and $1.47 in fiscal ’08. Weekly close on Oct. 5 Millions of Bits Per Second
Japan
Cisco, like most technology com- $1.5 $80 80
Emerging
panies, reports earnings before Markets
$2.6
60 67 60
option expenses.
Asia Pacific
Investors seem to have $2.7
40 40
$15.5
marked up their opinions of
Europe $6.3 20 20
Cisco, as well. Since early Au-
12
gust, the company’s shares North 0 0
(ticker: CSCO) have risen al- America ’00 ’01 ’02 ’03 ’04 ’05 ’06 Current By 2010
most 40%, to a recent 23.90. Yet, Sources: Bloomberg; Piper Jaffray
at 18.8 times next year’s esti-
mated earnings, the stock sports a lower A few years back, Cisco’s router sales is Cisco’s forte.
price/earnings multiple than most other flattened when Juniper Networks (JNPR) Similar efforts are unfolding abroad,
networking shares. As sales and profits seized the high end of the market with where upstarts like France’s Neuf and
begin to flow from new customers and new powerful routers designed for the core Italy’s Fastweb are challenging their coun-
markets, like Internet video,Wall Street is networks of telephone-service providers tries’ former telecom monopolies. CEO
likely to raise its stock-price targets. A like Verizon Communications (VZ). The Chambers says Cisco designed products
number of analysts think the shares easily competition forced Cisco to spend $500 like the CSR-1 with a vision of the coming
could tack on another 15%. million to develop a new router, the CSR- convergence. “We did not build the CSR-1
1, which could carry 100 times more traffic to do a billion phone calls,” he says. “We
Cisco didn’t invent the Internet, but few than Juniper’s. Since its launch in 2004, built it to do 100 million videos.”
other companies did as much to help it the CSR-1 has stormed the market, form- Suppliers of traditional telecommunica-
come of age. In the 1990s, as the dot-com ing the core of new networks at Sprint (S), tions equipment, such as Lucent Technolo-
bubble was inflating, Cisco’s sales in some Comcast (CMCSA), British Telecom gies (LU) and Nortel Networks (NT), have
years grew more than 50%. Revenue (BT) and Japan’s Softbank BB, while Ju- seen flat or falling demand from their
growth since has slackened to a comfort- niper has struggled to come up with a re- phone-service customers in recent years.
able low-to-mid-teens pace. Fiscal ’06 sales sponse. According to the Dell’Oro market- But spending on Internet equipment by
rose 15%,bolstered by the February acqui- research group, in Redwood City, Calif., phone and cable operators is growing by
sition of Scientific-Atlanta, a supplier of Cisco now enjoys about a 60% share of the 17% a year, says Mike Volpi, who runs Cis-
cable-television equipment. router market for such customers. co’s router and service- provider businesses.
Today almost 40% of Cisco’s revenue The development of the CSR-1 helped Volpi views his business unit as the arms
comes from the sale of switches, the basic place Cisco once more on the ground floor merchant in a war of competing communica-
movers of data packets through electronic of a revolution, this one involving the deliv- tions companies. But unlike the network
networks. Routers-the brainy parts of a ery of multiple services over a single net- spending of the 1990s, which was financed
network, which control and direct traffic- work. Until now, telephone, cable and by stock sales, today’s outlays are funded by
chip in a bit more than 20%. Around 20% satellite television each has been delivered these companies’ copious cash flow.
comes from new technologies like Internet via a different network technology. Now, The spending is likely to increase.
telephony and video, on which the compa- companies in all three industries are gear- When Verizon began installing its FiOS
ny is pinning much of its hopes for future ing up to offer customers a “triple play” of fiber-optic network in Massachusetts last
growth. Services account for the remaining voice, highspeed Internet and television year, Comcast countered by boosting the
15%. Total revenue topped $28 billion in service-and, before long, wireless and download speed of its cable-modem ser-
fiscal ’06 and is expected to rise to $33 bil- wireless TV-over a single network that vice. That required the cable company to
lion in the current fiscal year. uses the Internet Protocol technology that upgrade its routers.
2
3. “When we do a good job as a vendor, we get more productively. He’s got a credible
record in productivity improvement; Cisco
80% of the business and the second source pulls in more than $700,000 in revenue for
each employee, triple its nearest competi-
gets 20%,” says Cisco executive Mike Volpi. tor. Cisco will roll out its telepresence
product to its 70 sales offices next year,
“When we don’t do a good job, it’s 50/50.” and estimates it will break even on the in-
vestment in less than nine months. It ex-
Volpi is encouraged by Cisco’s win rate chief executive, Boaz Raviv. His company pects to save an annualized $100 million in
so far. “When we do a good job as a ven- created a consumer video-calling product travel expenses by year-end 2007.
dor, we get 80% of the business and the for Fastweb that uses the living-room tele-
second source gets 20%,” he says. “When vision as the conference-call’s video moni- Cisco’s video plans are but a piece of a
we don’t do a good job, it’s 50/50.” tor. With Cisco and Northrup Grumman larger ambition to lead in all forms of com-
(NOC), Radvision is building the world’s munication. In the same way that a phone
In the triple-play race so far, cable com- largest video-conferencing network, by company can run all communications over
panies have had great success selling tele- linking 1,500 meeting locations for the U.S. a single Internet-Protocol network, a large
phone service. They can charge a low fixed Defense Department. business now can use one IP network to
price because they run calls over Internet Cisco’s Chambers has used current- unify its various systems for e-mail, in-
style routers, most provided by Cisco. stant-messaging, project collabo-
Within about six months, Volpi says, Cisco ration, physical security and
Growth Engine PBX phones. Cisco believes the
routers also will incorporate digital-video
technologies. Internet Protocol-based tele- While Cisco’s other businesses are growing at a measured pace, annual market for “unified com-
vision, or IPTV, is the delivery technology sales of advanced technology have rocketed it recent quarters munications” solutions will reach
on demand for Internet video, telephony and conferencing. $10 billion within three to five
of choice for new providers of TV service
like AT&T, Verizon and Italy’s Fastweb. years.
The technology also will enable Cisco to Cisco Product Segments The company’s first communi-
Past five quarters: sales in billions cations products have been suc-
bring the home-alarm industry into the
digital age. Indeed, the company thinks it $3.0 cessful. In just a few years, Cisco
could create a billion-dollar market for grabbed the lead in the market
2.5 for PBX [private branch ex-
gear that transmits video from your baby’s
crib to your cell phone, or from a break-in change] internal phone switches,
to the local police station. 2.0 winning a 23% market share with
Best of all, the “data packets” carrying its Voice-over-Internet-Internet-
video are bigger than other kinds of net- 1.5
Protocol systems, according to
work traffic, and would require networks figures from Synergy Research
to upgrade their switches and routers. Group. In the July 2006 quarter,
1.0 Cisco shipped more than a mil-
High-definition video conferencing, for in-
stance, might use 10 times the network lion VoIP telephones. For a
bandwidth of other network traffic. “The 0.5 branch office or a medium-sized
more bits, the better for Cisco,”Volpi says. business, getting a PBX can be
To beguile enterprise customers with as simple as adding a card to Cis-
the virtues of video, Cisco soon will unveil FY FY FY FY co’s Integrated Services Router,
2006 2006 2006 2006
a sophisticated high-def video-conferenc- a Swiss Army knife-style product
Switches Routers Services Advanced
ing system. Companies such as Polycom Technology that also can become a network
(PLCM), Radvision (RVSN) and Nor- Note: Fiscal year ends in July. Source: Piper Jaffray firewall and a Wi-Fi network
way’s Tandberg have been selling video- base station, also by inserting
conferencing products for years, but Cisco generation video-conferencing products to new cards. Video surveillance soon will be-
could quickly become the market leader. confer with other executives, such as come another add-in feature.
Bob Hagerty, CEO of Pleasanton, Calif.- IBM’s Sam Palmisano. Chambers says he Cisco sells tens of thousands of ISR
based Polycom, guesses there have been can barely tell who’s who on the TV routers every quarter; the ISR ramped to
around a million video-conferencing sys- screen, and that he’d never use it to talk to a $1 billion annual sales rate within its
tems installed around the world, about half customers. But next-generation products first year, faster than any other Cisco
sold by his company. In May Polycom in- are another story, capable of delivering a product.
troduced its latest $250,000 video-confer- “telepresence.” Voice-over-Internet-Protocol solutions
encing set-up. In coming months it will up- “It’s video conferencing and data con- have dominated the PBX market with sur-
grade its product to high-definition. ferencing and IP telephony conferencing,” prising speed, forcing incumbent vendors
Competing with a high-def product of says Chambers. “You can play Texas like Avaya (AV) to revamp their product
its own will be Fair Lawn, N.J.-based Hold’em with three other groups at the lines. In 2002, VoIP products were about
Radvision, whose video-conferencing gear same time in different locations, as if you 15% of all PBX phone lines sold, says
has been sold under the Cisco label. Video were all at the same table.” Avaya CEO Lou D’Ambrosio. This year,
transmission over Internet-protocol net- Time permitting, you could also get he expects IP products will be 60% of PBX
works means video calls no longer need be some work done, and Chambers believes industry sales. The computer-like IP-PBX
a luxury for CEOs only, says Radvision’s collaborators would work 20% to 30% systems save companies money by letting
3
4. working. Microsoft and Cisco products
Sooner or later Cisco will pay a dividend, though may compete with each other, but at least
shareholders aren’t demanding one yet. The they’ll be able to talk to each other; the
two companies say they’ll work to ensure
company would like its eventual payout to be compatibility. Gupta says it’s a huge mar-
ket they’re both chasing: perhaps as large
more meaningful than Microsoft’s 1.5% yield. as $40 billion in annual sales.
While these new technologies are giv-
them use cheap Internet links, instead of fied-communications market that Cisco is ing Cisco’s current customers reason to
expensive trunk lines. They also allow targeting. In June Microsoft announced upgrade, Cisco also is seeing growth of
third-party software writers to invent several products planned for late 2007 that nearly 50% a year in its sale of networking
clever new applications. At the Wynn Las would handle VoIP phone calling, instant systems in emerging markets like Saudi
Vegas resort, for example, an Avaya IP messaging and video conferencing. Micro- Arabia. That growth results from sales in-
phone lets guests use many of the casino’s soft plans to take advantage of its huge in- vestments Cisco made in the past couple of
services from their night tables. stalled base by bundling some of the new years, just as it had done previously in
D’Ambrosio concedes that Cisco enjoys communications features into its ubiqui- India and China. A large sales force of
an advantage in selling IP products, as tous suite of PC applications, Microsoft Of- Cisco representatives is now making the
most large organizations own Cisco switch- fice, while adding other features to its pop- case for oil-rich nations to invest in net-
es and routers. So PBX incumbents like ular e-mail-server software, Microsoft works as a way to improve health care in
Avaya and Nortel strive to compete on the Exchange. There are more than 400 mil- those countries and create high-value jobs.
quality of their software applications. lion users of Microsoft Office and over 100 Today such countries represent 10% of
Many customers want their mission-critical million workers with mailboxes on an Ex- Cisco’s sales, but Chambers thinks they
phone systems to remain separate from change server. will contribute 30% to 50% of future
their networks, says Avaya’s CEO. Communications is a natural next step growth.
The University Hospitals Health Sys- for Microsoft, says Anoop Gupta, a vice If Cisco revs up its sales growth with
tem in Cleveland, Ohio, is not one, howev- president of the company’s unified commu- products for unified business communica-
er. The hospital complex has hired Cisco to nications group, “What are the key pain tions or consumer quadruple plays, its
replace its existing PBX, cable TV and points that information workers have?” he gross margins should remain in a range of
computer networks with a grand, unified asks. “Twenty years ago, it was creating 64% to 66%, says Dennis Powell, the com-
network, in an 18-month project costing documents and spreadsheets. Today, it’s pany’s company’s chief financial officer.
tens of millions of dollars. The hospitals’ how worldwide partners can collaborate.” That’s because the value added, in most
phone center will feature triple-redundant At the June announcement, Microsoft Cisco products, is software, whether it’s
systems, says the system’s chief informa- demonstrated how a worker on the road embedded in computer chips or part of the
tion officer Ed Marx. Medical records will could phone into the Exchange e-mail company’s network operating system.
be accessible instantly to authorized peo- server and tell it to read aloud from the Cisco generated free cash flow of $7 bil-
ple anywhere. Intercom announcements of text of freshly arrived e-mail messages. A lion in its July 2006 fiscal year. Financial
the “Code Blue, Unit 5700” variety will be writer could click on a person’s name chief Powell says the company wants to
a thing of the past as the network wire- where it appears in a Word document, and give shareholders the cash it isn’t invest-
lessly summons the required doctors and instantly be able to phone or e-mail that ing in new ventures or acquisitions. Since
nurses. person. A video conference demo featured September 2001 Cisco has shrunk its
The Cleveland system did not solicit a a tabletop gadget with a 360-degree cam- shares outstanding by about 25% through
network vendor other than Cisco, satisfied era at the top of a six-inch stalk. This $35.4 billion in stock buybacks. It still has
with the company’s promise of a certain “Roundtable” video-conferencing device $4.6 billion of firepower left under its
level of network performance, with finan- sends a panoramic view of everyone as- share-buyback authorization. Sooner or
cial penalties if the service fell short. sembled, and can zoom in on any speaker. later, Powell expects expects Cisco will
Indeed, many Cisco customers make But apart from devices like the Round- start paying a dividend, but there has been
just that one call, instead of soliciting com- table camera, the Microsoft unified com- no ground swell of shareholder demand
petitive bids. In a survey of 500 informa- munications solution is all software-with yet. When Cisco does initiate a dividend,
tion-technology buyers conducted in software’s attendant economies. “In our Powell would like it to be more meaningful
March by SG Cowen, 35% of respondents approach, there is no PBX,” says Gurdeep than the token 1.5% yield paid by Micro-
indicated they planned to move more of Singh Pall, another Microsoft VP. “It’s a soft (not including its special dividends).
their network spending to Cisco, while totally distributed architecture.” Investors probably will be happy to
only 4% expected to shift more to competi- If Microsoft sees communications going continue betting on John Chambers and
tors. Customer satisfaction is one reason from computer to computer, Cisco foresees his team. “We were $1 billion in sales
why strong challengers, such as China’s communications functions running on its when I took over, ten years ago,” he
Huawei, have yet to crimp Cisco’s 67% network gear. One Cisco advantage is its says.“We now move into new markets and
gross profit margins. head start; it has been selling communica- do $1 billion in each of them. No company
tions products for a few years, and can de- in the history of IT has ever done that in
If Cisco is leaving most of its traditional liver solutions that work out of the box. more than a couple of products, and we’re
networking rivals in the dust, there’s a Microsoft plans to start selling its software doing it repeatedly. We’re in the right spot
new competitor looming: Microsoft. The around the middle of 2007, and its third- at the right time, and we’re trying not to
Redmond, Wash., software behemoth party hardware and software partners mess that up.”
(MSFT) has its sights set on the same uni- may need more time to get everything Chances are, it won’t. n
4
