Cisco welcomes new CEO, announces other leadership changes

Tech titan Cisco Systems welcomed new CEO Chuck Robbins Monday, officially ending the 20-year-leadership of John Chambers, considered by many a Silicon Valley icon.

In a company blog post Monday, Robbins announced other management changes: Zorawar Biri Singh, former senior vice president of Hewlett-Packard's cloud business, will step in as Cisco's chief technology officer, and Kevin Brandy, a former senior vice president at Salesforce.com, will serve as Cisco's chief digital officer.

"A diverse set of perspectives and experiences is important to me as we build Cisco's next chapter," Robbins wrote. "We've looked at leaders from around the world, and I am convinced that we are adding two of the most strategic and innovative leaders to the Cisco team."

Robbins, who joined Cisco in 1997 as an account manager, said data will be the company's most strategic asset, and "it will be distributed across every part of our customers' organizations and ecosystems."

He said he is confident in the company's direction in place in the market because of the vision, strategy, and culture that Chambers built as CEO.

Chambers remains as Cisco's executive chairman and head of the company's board. After he was named CEO in 1995, the networking giant saw a revenue boost of $1.2 billion, and today hangs around $50 billion.

The former CEO was seen as an affable leader who put his employees first, and made the company one (really) big family. Under Chambers leadership, Cisco was briefly the the most valuable company in the world in 2000, with a market capitalization then of $557 billion.

Cisco shares were down slightly in trading Monday, to $28.22.

The San Jose, Calif.-based company said revenue for its quarter ended in May rose 5%, to $12.1 billion, narrowly beating Wall Street expectations.

Follow USA TODAY reporter Trisha Thadani on Twitter: @TrishaThadani