India to contribute 5% of Cisco's global revenue: CEO

LAS VEGAS: India's contribution to the revenues of networking solutions giant Cisco is poised to grow to 5% over the next five years on the back of strong demand for cloud and networking services, its CEO John Chambers said.
The California-based firm, which currently derives about two per cent of its global revenues of over $48 billion from India, is also rooting for a stable government to bring in "predictability" in the country's business environment.
"Right now, India's contribution is very small, about 2%. We are committed to the Indian market. It should be 5-10% of our revenues," Chambers said.
Asked about the timeline, Cisco senior vice president (Worldwide Field Operations) Chuck Robbins said it should be 5% in the next five years.
"We should grow over 20% every year over the next five years," he added.
Cisco employs over 10,000 people in India across cities like Bangalore, Delhi-NCR, Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata, Pune and Hyderabad. Of these, 8,000 people are part of the R&D set up.
"We are excited about the elections. Hopefully, it will bring in predictability...Stability is what we are looking for. Its like the US... even though our government was not taking decisions, our economy picked up. Once we get predictable in India in terms of making some decisions and people know which way its going, investors will be willing to go," Chambers said.
He added that the company will continue to invest in India.
Chambers said he hoped the new government would focus on predictability as it will help boost investor confidence in the country.
"Companies won't invest if they are not sure about the predictability. They will not bring in FDI if they are unsure. As basic as it sounds, once the US got predictable, for whatever reasons, you saw stock market going up, investment started to increase, jobs were being created.
"Getting predictability back in India is crucial. We are committed either ways, but predictability will help," he added.