Electronics News
- Cisco set to plunge bigtime into China
Date: 2-Nov-2007 Sources: (Xinhua Online)
BEIJING, Nov. 2-- CISCO Systems Inc plans to invest 16 billion U.S. dollars within three to five years in China, the company's chief executive John Chambers said during a visit to Beijing yesterday.
The investment, including a 17.5 million dollars investment in Alibaba.com which will be traded in Hong Kong soon, almost doubles Cisco's 8.5 billion dollars investment in China since 2002, according to the world's biggest computer networking maker.
The investment will be multi-sectored and include local procurement, venture capital, education, research and development.
'Today's announcement marks the next chapter in Cisco's development in China,' said Chambers.
A broad range of growth opportunities exists in China, particularly as an innovator in the next wave of the Internet's development and in collaboration with Web 2.0 technologies, Chambers said.
Cisco also signed with the China Development Bank yesterday to explore a joint investment program that will provide capital and expertise for innovative Chinese businesses. Cisco has invested 700 million dollars through venture capital in China already.
Cisco also signed with Alibaba Group, China's largest business-to-business (B2B) on-line portal, to jointly explore ways to offer systems to about 25 million small and medium businesses (SMBs) in China.
Under a previous agreement, Cisco will invest 17.5 million dollars in Alibaba.com Ltd as part of its planned initial public offering on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.
Cisco, which announced last month a plan to cooperate with Chinese home appliance maker Haier, aims to become a provider covering both enterprise and consumers, a change from its 'routers maker' traditional image, industry insiders said.
Meanwhile, Cisco established a fund of up to 400 million dollars to provide financing facilities to Cisco customers in China over the next three to five years. Cisco Systems Capital China commenced captive financing operations in June 2006 and has funded 60 million dollars in customer assets to date.
Chambers will increase its procurement value in China - that reached 7 billion dollars over the past five years.
Cisco's other programs include cooperating with China's Ministry of Education to add 300 additional network-based academies in colleges during the next three years, with a specific focus on China's central and western provinces.
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