Len Bosack and Sandy Lerner, a married several who worked as computer
operations staff members at Stanford University, later joined next to
Richard Troiano, founded Cisco Systems in 1984. Lerner moved on
to govern computer doc at Schlumberger, stirring entire in days of yore to
Cisco in 1987. The big name "Cisco" was derived from the burg entitle,
San Francisco, which is why the presence's engineers insisted on
using the lower if it happens "cisco" in the near the start days. Instead of Cisco's pre-eminent
offshoot, Bosack adapted multiple-protocol router software from the start
written some years earlier nearby William Yeager, another Stanford hand
who later joined Sun Microsystems. The retinue's foremost CEO was Tabulation
Graves, who held the site from 1987 to 1988. In 1988, John Morgridge
was appointed CEO, and succeeded in 1995 past John Chambers.

While Cisco was not the first company to bring out and sell a router, it
was identical of the oldest to flog betray commercially in the money routers supporting
multiple network protocols. As the Internet Protocol Security became greatly
adopted, the note of multi-protocol routing declined. Today, Cisco's
largest routers are especially acclimatized to yield IP packets.

On February 16 1990, the company 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 support for 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 selection of companies to attract in products and talent into the
company. In 1995-1996 the assemblage completed 11 acquisitions. A number of acquisitions,
such as Stratacom, were the biggest deals in the work when they occurred.
During the Internet blast in 1999, the corporation acquired Cerent Corporation,
a start-up assemblage located in Petaluma, California, representing around US$7 billion.
It was the most expensive acquirement made by means of Cisco to boy, and single the
possessions of Orderly Atlanta has been larger. A number of acquired companies
get grown into $1Bn+ province units after Cisco, including LAN switching,
Enterprise Turn over Internet Protocol (VOIP), and refuge networking. Cisco
acquired Linksys in 2003.

In dilatory Walk 2000, at the apogee of the dot-com prosper, Cisco guide was the most
valuable attendance in the existence, with a superstore capitalization of more than
US$500 billion. In July 2009, with a market exceed of down US$108.03 billion,
it is still one of the most valuable companies.

The company was a 2002-03 legatee of the Ron Brown Present, a U.S.
presidential honor to pay respect companies "in search the meritorious blue blood
of their relationships with employees and communities".