July 13, 2007, 9:17 AM — John Chambers, CEO of Cisco Systems Inc., spoke with Computerworld Hong Hong (CWHK) about the SMB market, the company's new TelePresence high-definition video-conferencing technology, Web 2.0 and a lesson learned about avatars.
CWHK: You said [in your keynote] that SMBs tend to react faster than enterprises, can you elaborate on that?
Chambers: SMBs tend to make decisions quickly because of their business knowledge and their ability to view technology as a way to achieve their goals. Very often large enterprises evaluate the technology, evaluate the options, have a business sponsor, and roll it out carefully over time. So, often SMBs understand the business options quicker.
One thing that may change the equation for enterprises is when you see an application like TelePresence where you just simply don't need to explain it: the CEO can see [the benefit] right away. It isn't like many enterprise apps where it takes 3-4 years to implement and integrate with the applications you put on top of it, to make it effective in the long-term.
With TelePresence, it's a best-case scenario: simple, integrated, converged. When you see it, you know you're going to save on business travel [and] on your service and support models. We think that TelePresence will have a major impact.
CWHK: You also said that you expect your own company to save about US$150 million annually.
Chambers: That's correct. That's money in the bank, and it was very easy to do. That's before you do the 'fancy stuff': how you use this technology to work from home a little bit differently, how to design your sensors to run your office more effectively, more efficient data center usage.
CWHK: Obviously TelePresence is aimed at reducing business travel, thus helping enterprises to improve their "carbon footprint." Do you see other opportunities for Cisco to improve their "green" profile?
>Chambers:There are many ways, whether it's improving the efficiency of your data centers, or improving the functionalities of equipment that's not being used to its fullest potential. Part of it is personalizing use of technology: when you can get the information you want in the medium you want it in, whether it be email, voice or video, that's a gain in efficiency as well. We believe in open architecture, simplicity, and interoperability, and these [qualities] make this personalization possible.
Back to TelePresence, we think that any company deploying this technology will save 10-20 percent on their business travel costs. This isn't something we developed overnight, we've taken about six years of development to get to this point.
CWHK: Tell us something you've learned recently, in the course of running your business, that's surprised you.
Chambers: One thing I've found surprising is that our research shows people are often more willing to talk to a character, an avatar [on video] rather than an actual person. Why is this important? Take an area like health care, where people might be uncomfortable discussing issues of a personal nature with another person, but are more likely to be honest when talking to an avatar.
So, that surprised me, but if you think about it, it makes sense.
CWHK: One of the themes of this conference is: "the network is the platform." How do you see this playing out in the context of the enterprise space?
Chambers: We'll see a blurring of traditional boundaries. It's not going to be enterprise-to-consumer or enterprise as service provider. It's going to be any combination of networks, and any combination of devices, to anyone in the world. I think that time and distance will become less important in terms of collaboration.
CWHK: As one of IT's better known leaders, what's your position on corporate social responsibility (CSR)? What advice do you have for other business leaders on CSR?
Chambers: Corporate social responsibility is simply good for business. I've been saying that for years, and I used to be in the minority, but now I see more businesses in all sectors starting to realize this. In the past the attitude used to be "that's not the responsibility of the CEO," but I disagree with that. I think companies, especially large and successful ones, will benefit from a proactive corporate social responsibility policy.
