Vortex 2003: A powerhouse of CEOs in one room : Of Cisco, Linksys and Vortex 2003

Vortex 2003: A powerhouse of CEOs in one room
Of Cisco, Linksys and Vortex 2003

Network World, 04/10/03

Last month, during the Wireless LANs Technology Tour, we interrupted our seminar to share some breaking news with the audience. No, not about the war in Iraq. Tom Henderson, my co-moderator for the event, announced to everyone that Cisco was buying up Linksys.

The $500 million stock swap deal forced gasps from the Dallas crowd. Henderson nodded his head resignedly and said, "Yep, it's true."

Some folks were happy that Linksys, the leading small business wireless gear vendor, was getting some might behind it. Others were worried that it was just going to get sucked up into the vortex where other Cisco acquisitions have disappeared. We found out later that Cisco intends to operate Linksys, its 81st acquisition, as an autonomous division.
(Read more at http://www.nwfusion.com/news/2003/0320ciscolinksys.html?page=1.)

Interestingly, almost everyone had a reaction to the news, which proves that Linksys has quite the market penetration. In fact, according to my colleague Remote Networking Managing Editor Toni Kistner, Linksys holds 40% of the retail networking market. This gives Cisco an instant hold on the small office/home office arena - and an easy play to extend its gear past the enterprise to the wired and wireless needs of the remote and branch offices. Cisco will add Linksys' more than 70 products to its lineup.

One Technology Tour delegate commented that he would love to ask Cisco what it intends to do with Linksys. Ironically, attendees to IDG Executive Forums' Vortex 2003 conference next month will get to hear first-hand what prompted the buy and what the future holds.

As Executive Producer John Gallant reports in his Vortex Digest, Cisco's Charlie Giancarlo and Dan Scheinman will be speaking at the conference, which will be held May 18 - 20 in Laguna Niguel, Calif. Giancarlo is senior vice president and general manager of product development while Scheinman is senior vice president of corporate development. Both will discuss the merger and its importance to Cisco's product strategy. Gallant says he might also get a glimpse from them what other companies Cisco intends to snap up.

Gallant's got a powerhouse lineup of company CEOs in store for attendees, including Verizon's Ivan Seidenberg, EMC's Joseph Tucci, Nortel's Frank Dunn and my favorite, Intel's Craig Barrett. I'm anxious to hear what Barrett thinks is the next big thing that will drive computer use. What's sparking Intel to continue create even more powerful chips. After all, we haven't really seen the killer applications that were promised years ago to drive the need for greater processing power. Some speculate that online gaming and media-rich applications are going to catch on like wildfire. Others say that advances in health care imagery, grid computing and other such "large file" technologies will drive the need for speed. Wonder what Barrett is selling to the shareholders as the reasoning?

Look for other big names to stop by the Vortex stage, including James Ramo, who's making news as the CEO of Movielink and Tom Nolle, president of network consulting firm CIMI who will offer up his "unconventional wisdom" about the network industry.

I know how much time and effort Gallant puts into making Vortex incredibly informative and entertaining. And I assure you it's not to be missed.

Check out http://www.idgconferences.com/V3S7 to learn more about the conference and how to register. If you attend, drop me a line to tell me what you thought.

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