BEIJING, Nov. 2-- CISCO Systems Inc plans to invest
16 billion U.S. dollars within three to five years in China, the company's chief
executive John Chambers said during a visit to Beijing yesterday.
The investment, including a 17.5 million dollars
investment in Alibaba.com which will be traded in Hong Kong soon, almost doubles
Cisco's 8.5 billion dollars investment in China since 2002, according to the
world's biggest computer networking maker.
The investment will be multi-sectored and include
local procurement, venture capital, education, research and development.
"Today's announcement marks the next chapter in
Cisco's development in China," said Chambers.
A broad range of growth opportunities exists in
China, particularly as an innovator in the next wave of the Internet's
development and in collaboration with Web 2.0 technologies, Chambers said.
Cisco also signed with the China Development Bank
yesterday to explore a joint investment program that will provide capital and
expertise for innovative Chinese businesses. Cisco has invested 700 million
dollars through venture capital in China already.
Cisco also signed with Alibaba Group, China's largest
business-to-business (B2B) on-line portal, to jointly explore ways to offer
systems to about 25 million small and medium businesses (SMBs) in China.
Under a previous agreement, Cisco will invest 17.5
million dollars in Alibaba.com Ltd as part of its planned initial public
offering on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.
Cisco, which announced last month a plan to cooperate
with Chinese home appliance maker Haier, aims to become a provider covering both
enterprise and consumers, a change from its "routers maker" traditional image,
industry insiders said.
Meanwhile, Cisco established a fund of up to 400
million dollars to provide financing facilities to Cisco customers in China over
the next three to five years. Cisco Systems Capital China commenced captive
financing operations in June 2006 and has funded 60 million dollars in customer
assets to date.
Chambers will increase its procurement value in China
- that reached 7 billion dollars over the past five years.
Cisco's other programs include cooperating with
China's Ministry of Education to add 300 additional network-based academies in
colleges during the next three years, with a specific focus on China's central
and western provinces.
(Source: Shanghai Daily)
