Cisco announces $1.1b investment initiative

NEW DELHI: Cisco Systems, maker of Internet equipment, has announced an investment initiative totaling $1.1 billion in India. Cisco Systems president and CEO John Chambers announced this on the first day of his three-day visit to India. This is the largest business investment of Cisco outside of the US.

Detailing Cisco's three year expansion plan in the country, Chambers said, “We will invest $750 million in R&D activities, $150 million on leasing and other financial solutions to Cisco customers and partners and $100 million each on venture capital and customer support operations.”

Cisco currently employs around 1,400 people in India and according to Chambers this number would triple in the next three years.

To support Indian National E-Governance Plan, Cisco will establish the state wide area network (SWAN) Advanced Technology Enablement Program. Under this, Cisco will provide networking equipment for establishing a SWAN Advanced Technology Center of Excellence (CoE).

In addition to this, Cisco will set up an IP-based Next Generation Network (NGN) lab with Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) in Chennai. The lab will support BSNL's telecom network evolution by providing an environment to test services before rolling out on the actual network. To support these two initiatives, Cisco will invest a company $10 million.

Cisco will also support the government's initiative of establishing “Common Service Centers” (CSC) in villages in India. The company would provide networking equipment necessary to build networking infrastructure for up to 100 villages. Cisco will also support a year-long series of activities including senior-level workshops, research, reference visits and a national E-Government Summit, to be held in 2006.