NDS was $5B, Scientific Atlanta $7B so I'm guessing Tandberg, $3B. CEO, head of R&D and others went off to form Acano which, 4 years after they left, Cisco bought back for $700M.
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The strategy is to innovate through acquisition. Makes sense when you have tons of cash overseas and no other way to bring it back besides buying companies, buying back stock and increasing dividends. Wall Street and the puppet ELT is what drives the company now. Internal investment suffers as do the employees.
I've seen this happen many times before. What you end up with is a hodge-podge of technologies and product offerings that nobody knows how to or cares to hobble together into something meaningful. When all is said and done, the acquired company's founders and core brains (the real value) are long gone with their nice payouts and what is left are the people who didn't get a package and a technology bundle nobody knows what to do with. The $3 Billion spent amounts to $1 Million in real value 3 years later.
Just another sign of a company with no rudder and 50 highly-paid retards clambering for the disconnected wheel.
@mao - Elt seems to have less faith in internal staff to execute new projects
BINGO!
So, rather than find an exec with some vision (that's not all shallow BS) and have them go and create something with a team built up internally, we fire all the existing folks and then buy-in a company of freaks with some half-baked proof of concept and lots of attitude about their own value. This means that valuable employees with skills, demonstrated capability and a desire to move into a new field cannot, since there are none internally. They have to wait around until the sword falls, or try to muscle into a buy-in (which is usually a closed shop in a different location).
Which strategy ?
The "strategy of the month" ?
Let's face it Cisco's strategy is to survive, just like the deadwood in their company.
Elt seems to have less faith in internal staff to execute new projects than external buy ins who often bring in half baked kit that needs years to set right after the initial set of employees have decamped....the cycle continues. ..
It is a way to dilute the share holder values (especially those who invest in 401k) and enrich executives and the "investors" who hold personal ties with the executives. Since the purpose is not really about "acquiring" new technology, this explains why nearly all the acquisitions failed in a year or two after joining Cisco.
are you speaking of scientific atlanta, or NDS?