Cisco and Ericsson to partner.
Today we are taking an important step forward in our transformation journey. Ericsson and Cisco are announcing a multi-faceted partnership to create the networks of the future – and through this, shape the direction of the industry. Both companies have invested a lot of time in designing this partnership over the past year, and I am thrilled to be able to announce it today.
As industry leaders, we have worked together to develop a joint vision for innovation and customer success. Cisco brings their leading position in IP and a strong presence in enterprise. We bring our leadership in mobile networks, our strength in global services, and strong relationships with the world’s leading service providers.
Between us and Cisco, we hold more than 56,000 patents, invest $11 billion annually in research and development, and operate more than 76,000 services professionals serving customers in more than 180 countries.
The strength of this partnership lies not just in its scale, but in the depth of the solutions Ericsson and Cisco can now provide to the networking market. It is a market in transition – increasingly mobile, cloud-based, and digital – and customers are seeking end-to-end solutions to reach their full potential.
We have evaluated the impact of acquisitions, our own development, and other strategic opportunities – and this partnership is by far the best way forward. We believe that this partnership will create the most value both for our customers and for Ericsson and Cisco.
We have a clear, joint view of how to execute on the partnership to ensure we can quickly offer our customers added value. Initially the partnership will focus on service providers, then on opportunities for the enterprise segment and accelerating the scale and adoption of IoT services across industries. We have already signed a reseller agreement with associated services opportunities for Ericsson. Ericsson engineers will also team up with Cisco engineers to kick-start our collaboration via a joint initiative focusing on SDN/NFV and network management and control.
For Ericsson, this partnership also fortifies the IP strategy we have developed over the past several years, and it is a key step forward in our own transformation. It will start generating revenues for Ericsson as soon as 2016, ramping up to USD 1 billion by 2018 and building from there.