Analysts: Buys must continue at Cisco.(Cisco Systems Inc.)(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)

Publication: The Daily Deal

Publication Date: 17-SEP-01

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COPYRIGHT 2001 The Deal LLC

Byline: Sarah Cohen

Networking equipment giant Cisco Systems Inc. can't afford to stand still.

After 73 acquisitions over eight years, buying technology expertise and market share has become not just its modus operandi but a corporate way of life. The strategy worked as sales grew to $22 billion in the year ending July 28, 2001 from $649 million in fiscal 1993.

But analysts say Cisco needs to continue rolling out technologies, gaining engineers and seeking new marketplaces in a key tech arena fraught with problems -- telecom equipment carriers.

Cisco's most likely targets: troubled telecom equipment providers such as Nortel Networks Corp. of Brampton, Ontario, Lucent Technologies Inc. of Murray Hill, N.J. or Alcatel SA of Paris. "If Cisco doesn't make a move to acquire a large chunk of the carrier market," says Charles Pluckhahn, head of telecommunications...

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