Len Bosack and Sandy Lerner, a married yoke who worked as computer
operations team members at Stanford University, later joined nearby
Richard Troiano, founded Cisco Systems in 1984. Lerner moved on
to direct computer software at Schlumberger, stirring well-shaped in days of yore to
Cisco in 1987. The delegate "Cisco" was derived from the municipality high regard,
San Francisco, which is why the assemblage's engineers insisted on
using the discredit lawsuit "cisco" in the prehistoric days. In the interest Cisco's earliest
output, Bosack adapted multiple-protocol router software from the start
written some years before nearby William Yeager, another Stanford worker
who later joined Brown Microsystems. The company's first CEO was Bill
Graves, who held the site from 1987 to 1988. In 1988, John Morgridge
was appointed CEO, and succeeded in 1995 via John Chambers.

While Cisco was not the basic convention to bring out and push a router, it
was bromide of the oldest to flog betray commercially in the money routers supporting
multiple network protocols. As the ip Accountable became greatly
adopted, the importance of multi-protocol routing declined. Today, Cisco's
largest routers are especially acclimatized to deliver IP packets.

On February 16 1990, the assemblage went public (with a market capitalization
of $224 million) and was listed on the Nasdaq stock exchange. On August 28, 1990,
Lerner was fired; upon hearing the expos‚, Bosack resigned to exhibit his funding in compensation her.
Bosack and his old lady walked away from Cisco with $170 million, 70% of which was
committed to charities. The two later divorced.

Cisco acquired a medley of companies to disgorge in products and tendency into the
company. In 1995-1996 the attendance completed 11 acquisitions. Several acquisitions,
such as Stratacom, were the biggest deals in the production when they occurred.
During the Internet prosperity in 1999, the corporation acquired Cerent Corporation,
a start-up firm located in Petaluma, California, representing fro US$7 billion.
It was the most up-market acquirement made at hand Cisco to antiquated, and at best the
obtaining of Scientific Atlanta has been larger. A number of acquired companies
have grown into $1Bn+ responsibility units after Cisco, including LAN switching,
Purpose Bring up over Internet Protocol (VOIP), and home networking. Cisco
acquired Linksys in 2003.

In dilatory March 2000, at the crest of the dot-com increase, Cisco ppt was the most
valuable company in the world, with a market capitalization of more than
US$500 billion. In July 2009, with a hawk lid of down US$108.03 billion,
it is pacify individual of the most valuable companies.

The group was a 2002-03 receiver of the Ron Brown Prize, a U.S.
presidential honor to concede companies "for the superior property
of their relationships with employees and communities".