About
Cisco Systems, Inc. is a multinational corporation with over 70,000 employees with annual revenue of US$40 billion as of 2010. There was a short time in March of 2000 when Cisco actually ranked as the most valuable company worldwide, reaching a total market capitalization of $555 billion. Sandy Lerner and Len Bosack, a married couple who worked as computer operations staff for Stanford University, later joined by Richard Troiano, began Cisco Systems in 1984. Leonard and Sandra started designing and built routers in their own house and experimented using Stanford’s network. Initially, Leonard and Sandra took the proposal of building and selling routers on a commercial level to Stanford to help fund this idea, but they were rejected. After two years of developing networking equipment in Leonard’s and Sandra’s garage, they sold their first product in 1986.
Their headquarters are in San Jose.
According to John Morgridge, employee and the company's first president, the founders hit on the name and logo while driving to Sacramento to register the company. They saw the Golden Gate Bridge framed in the sunlight. Cisco’s name is derived from the city San Francisco
Cisco is one of the leading manufacturers of network equipment. Cisco's primary business is in internetworking products, such as routers, bridges, and switches. Cisco Systems also sponsors a line of IT Professional certifications for Cisco products.
Five Levels of IT Certification
