CISCO India lets go 500 workers
By Anjuj Dixit

CISCO, with the largest share of the global network equipment market, earned revenue of $10.4 Billion in the Quarter ending Feb, 2011 which was an increase of 6 percent over the last Quarter.  Its net income in those last 3 months was $1.5 Billion. CISCO has an employee count of 73,000. While announcing the results in Feb, the CISCO Chairman was cautious about future revenue.

CISCO Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, John Chambers, joined the company in 1991 and saw it grow from $70 million in revenue to $40 Billion last year. In early April, 2011,   John Chambers sent out an email to his entire company praising their strengths but making it clear that “they have disappointed investors and confused employees”

Cisco Systems' CEO John Chambers, in the first week of April, had announced plans for a company shake-up in tough times. Chambers had said that while the company's strategy was sound, aspects of its operational execution were not. This has resonated across the globe and Indian employees are a concerned lot. It is learnt that around 500 employees in India have been handed out their pink papers. Cisco has about 7000 employees in India; it has its Globalization Center here, which it says houses some world class talent, and even its Executive Vice President and Chief Globalization Officer Wim Elfrink is based out of Bangalore.

The axe seems to have fallen mostly on Cisco's Consumer Product division, which is not making money in India and which analysts say is a low margin business.

"We have been slow to make decisions, we have had surprises where we should not, and we have lost the accountability that has been a hallmark of our ability to execute consistently for our customers and our shareholders. That is unacceptable," Chambers wrote in the e-mail. Chambers said Cisco would refocus on its core markets in routers and switching, collaboration, datacentre virtualisation and video.  "Bottom line, we have lost some of the credibility that is foundational to Cisco's success - and we must earn it back," he wrote.

While most industry watchers go ga ga over Indian talent, perhaps, some companies' think otherwise.