Cisco CEO John Chambers on Web 2.0, Collaboration, Avatars and Mashups
Fri, July 13, 2007
CWHK: Tell us something you've learned recently, in the course of running your business, that's surprised you.
JC: 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?
JC: 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?
JC: 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.
A good example of this is the Middle East. In our operations there we've aligned with governments to help promote education and health care, we've focused on how to change things and help countries evolve. Now we're seeing these initiatives helping these countries develop a middle class, improve their economies and when people see they have an economic future, we think that makes a difference. We see the same thing in eastern Europe, see the same thing in Asia, see the same thing in Latin America.
CWHK: Cisco is involved in so many different market segments. Overall, where do you see your particular growth-areas?
JC: Video is the "killer app" for the whole networking and entertainment industry. It'll be used for collaboration tools like TelePresence, but also for entertainment, and we see tremendous growth in this area.
