Cisco Plans First Major Acquisition Since Strategy Overhaul

Cisco Systems today announced its intent to acquire AXIOSS software from Helsinki-based Comptel Corporation for approximately $31 million in cash.

The acquisition will enable Cisco to extend network and service management technology across its Internet Protocol (IP) network platforms. AXIOSS software will also aid in enhancing Cisco Prime—a unified network management solution for enterprises and service providers.

This acquisition is in line with the re-focus CEO John Chambers called for in an April internal memo. In it, Chambers vowed to get the company back to its core enterprise networking roots and to focus on five areas driving the growth of networks and the Internet: core routing, switching, and services; collaboration; data center virtualization and cloud; video; and architectures for business transformation.

The AXIOSS software suite will provide management capabilities for network services across these five areas, according to a statement by Cisco. The goal is to ease launching and management of new video, data, mobility, and cloud services for solution providers to customers.

Although AXIOSS' software has already been integrated into Cisco's managed services
solutions, the acquisition will strengthen Cisco Prime, particularly for solutions/service providers with automated ordering and fulfillment.

"As more users, connected mobile Internet devices and bandwidth intensive applications drive the explosive growth in IP-based networks, service providers continue to invest in their infrastructure to support customers' needs," said Jesper Anderson, senior vice president and general manager for
Cisco's Network Management Technology Group (NMTG). "With the acquisition of AXIOSS software and talent, we will help enable service providers to generate greater profits using a single management architecture to drive quick monetization and optimization of their Cisco network investments."

The networking giant's last acquisition was newScale Inc. in March—a software provider of business cloud services.