Cisco Plans Its Home Invasion

theodp writes "Despite lots of scars from earlier consumer craziness which included an Internet-connected fridge, Newsweek reports Cisco has set its sights on your living room, including videoconferencing which would let CEO John Chambers watch his beloved Duke basketball with far-away relatives. While recent acquisitions of Linksys and Scientific Atlanta make Cisco the only company that can come in on top of technology that's already inside homes, some skeptics say speaking to the consumer is simply not in Cisco's genes."

Linksys is a recent aquisition

[9mm Censor]

"While recent acquisitions of Linksys..." 3 years ago.

Re:A prerequisite

[grumling]

If Cisco plans to "invade" homes, they'll have to drop their IOS crap. Or at least develop a graphical management system.

Well, if you look at the top left corner on this site [linksys.com], you'll see that Linksys is a division of Cisco Systems. The very same Cisco that is the subject of the article.

I really don't think they are planning on selling the standard home user a 7200VXR chassis!

Re:A prerequisite

[Anonymous Coward]

Cisco already has a GUI for it's routers (along with a variety of UIs for other devices).. named SDM (Secure Device Manager). It has firewall, intrustion prevention, secure configuration, and a slew of other features to set up a feature-filled device. Those that believe the IOS is crap are those that don't understand it. Being an admin of a carrier-grade network I'll take a CLI over a fluffy UI any day of the week. It's extrememly powerful and offers features that others in the industry try to simulate. Agreed that a nice UI will be required for a consumer, but that UI needs to be an extension of the IOS feature-set rather than a replacement. Why fix what's not broken?

Re:A prerequisite

[Enoch Zembecowicz]

I agree entirely. I would like to add to your point (if I may). One area where a command line owns over GUIs (and will for quite some time) is usability over a slow link. My employer's network has many sites that are literally hundreds of miles apart, and frequently unmanned. We have dialup modems hooked into console servers should we lose our internet link to these facilities. They're a little choppy, but they work. I can not imagine being able to run a GUI of any sort over that kind of connection. I don't wish IOS had a graphical way to set things up, in fact I'm glad it doesn't.

Vision of Cisco is bigger than you think

[1336.5]

OK let me bring some insight as to what potential is avaiable for Cisco to enter the home market.

Time Warner is one of Cisco's biggest customers. Time Warner is also a huge player in the broadband and home cable market.

Cisco's aquisition of Scientific Atlantic brings a Cisco owned product in to the home user cable market.

Cisco's recent agreement to purchase SyPixx Networks Inc (http://newsroom.cisco.com/dlls/2006/corp_030706.h tml?CMP=ILC-001 [cisco.com]) also brings them in to the home security market.

Now let's put the peices together.

Time Warner and Cisco are partners. Time Warner purchases Cisco equipment to provide VoIP and broadband services. Now lets add in a set top cable box. It is not unfeasable that Cisco will develop a way to utilize its virtual private storage solution in to this equation. What does this mean? Cisco becomes a service like TiVo. In fact take this to the service provider level instead of the home user level. Virtual Private Storage provisioned out to ever customer Time Warner has. Can you imagine 200+ channels of on demand video streams over IP to your TV through the cable box? Every single channel Time Warner provides stored on cisco storage clusters to provide consumers with prerecorded (or live) video 24 hours a day! It is actually a TiVo killer unless you want to record, but I dont think Cisco will leave that capability out of its set top boxes when this solution is offered.

Now add home surveilance in to the equation. Not only will your cable be provided on demand via IP video streams, 24 hour a day surveilance is now available. A home security system for your house provided by Cisco Systems, fully integratable to be accessed by your cable set top boxes so you can be weary of intruders before they know you are aware of them. Not only that, the slightest storage capability of these set top boxes can record the video and archive it on a storage solution offered by Cisco Systems, and remember, all provided through Time Warner Cable service.

For those that say Cisco is incapable of speaking to the home user market on the home user level, I have one word for you. Linksys.

-anonymous cisco employee

ps. Attn Cisco: GIT'R DONE! I love this company!