there are a lot of good points here. In summary, there are couple issues
both internal cisco and external
macro env.
1. cisco switch positioning has been a mess in last couple of years. Nexus
series vs Catalyst 6K and 4K.
overlapping and competing each other. N7K becomes upgrade path for
traditional C6k dominant DC. It
gains traction. However, N7K pricing/performance ratio is low compared C6k.
C6k has bigger fat margin. So
revenue and profit both are impacted for innovative ideas. Once cisco sales
complains about the same
amount of effort but resulting in much less switch account and revenue for
N7K compared to C6k.
2. The campus side, Cat6k hit by Cat4k as well. aggressive pricing on 4K
resulting in slow down C6k spend.
Cisco really positioned to kill Cat6k for some reason. But none of other
switches in Cisco or in industry have
complete feature set as Cat6k. They did not put any investment and
innovation into 6k. Give a space for
Juniper or other to enter.
3. Overall cisco might sell same amount of switches ports N7K/5k/2K/4k/6k
but each port cost/charge is
much less than Cat6k days. that is where rev comes to low.
4. between new product Nexus and old Catalyst, huge feature gaps result in
slow adoption rate. lack of
investment in Catalyst also slowed down people's trust on 6k roadmap and
future.
5. Small vendor has some niche like low-latency 10G/BNT/A*, but very small
percentage.
6. HP has been biggest threat to cisco, because from BC HP FEX10 has been
server access replacement in
DC for N5k/2k. And cisco refused to make another blade switch for HP still
but try to push for UCS
adoption.
7. Juniper has been in and out to some of cisco account. But overall,
switching is not a play for them.
8. Support absolutely a key decision factor. So far cisco has best support
nobody can argue other than
sometime they do not have good product to begin with:)
If you talk to every customer - people always complaints about vendor no
matter which one cisco/juniper
whatever. In the end of day, people will buy whoever sucks *least*.
you heard me right, they will always say cisco sucks, Juniper sucks, but in
one product family who sucks
less will got picked.
