Cisco reported first quarter net sales of $9.6 billion, up $1.4 billion from last year, and net income of $2.2 billion, up from $1.6 billion a year ago.
Despite an increase in the sale of its core routing and switching products, the company’s stock took a hit on remarks by CEO John Chambers that the company was seeing weakness in two customer segments: automotive companies and financial institutions.
Nonetheless, Chambers was optimistic: “We believe the migration to the second phase of the Internet and the proliferation of networked Web 2.0 technologies will help drive dramatic gains in productivity and innovation across all industries. If this market transition continues to unfold as we expect, it has the potential to power Cisco’s and the industry’s growth for many years to come.”
During the quarter, Cisco announced an agreement to purchase WiMAX specialist Navini Networks, and bought Cognio and Latigent. The former does wireless spectrum analysis and management for wireless networks; the latter provides Web-based business intelligence and analytics reporting solutions, focused on contact centers.
Cisco also continued to refine its Carrier Ethernet products, part of its IP Next-Generation Network (IP NGN) architecture portfolio, extending fiber-to-the-home to apartment buildings and other multi-tenant units and allowing deployment of more services more quickly.
Cisco’s Linksys unit introduced eight new “smart switches” for small environments, corporate workgroups or network edge applications that require simple Web management, network security and easy installation.