Valuing Collaboration: Cisco pays $3bn cash for WebEx

Having just pointed to resources on practical steps for collaboration today's Financial Times technology section story "Cisco in $3bn cash deal for WebEx" caught my attention, especially the closing paragraph:

"Cisco has been investing heavily in non-core businesses as it attempts to capture more of the value of the information that flows through its switches and routers and into businesses and the home."

I've been watching the news stories about Cisco acquiring small social networking technology companies starting with Five Across . Infoworld reported:

"Cisco doesn't plan to set up its own social-networking site to compete against News Corp.'s MySpace or Facebook. Instead, it will use Five Across technology to create software that will help enterprises better connect with their customers. In addition, service providers may be able to build services with the technology and sell them to their business customers, Cisco said."

and more recently "selected assets", according to the Cisco press release, of Utah Street Networks. Yahoo Finance explains assets not bought included Tribe.net, the social networking site the Utah Networks platform operates.

Watching the Cisco Human Network site I've been trying to understand Cisco's strategy. Their $3.2b WebEx purchase and new Media Solutions Group makes clear Cisco believes, as their "Human Network" tagline suggests:

"When we're all connected, great things happen. Join us and see how life on the network is changing life as we know it."

~ Jenny Ambrozek