The Unified Computing SystemInnovation in Architecture, Technology, Services and

Partnerships

Cisco UCS Product Launch

PR Results SummaryMarch 2009

Corporate Communications Objectives and Results

Demonstrate the relevance of the network as the platform in the evolving data center.

Differentiate Cisco’s Unified Computing System: unique technology, ecosystem

and services approach

Position Cisco as a data center leader offering an innovative new architecture

Record Results Across the Board! Traditional Media: 3.96 Billion media impact; 98% Positive and 2% negative (English

language global data March 14-25)

New Media: Record high traffic for Cisco blogs. Platform blog: 18K+. Data Center blog (CMO bloggers!): 16K. 500+ comments posted to non-Cisco blogs about Cisco business (Neutral: 75%, Positive: 13%, Negative: 12%); Twitter community – 455K impressions, 3,100 Tweets.

News@Cisco Online: Record high traffic for releases: 85K total views for 8 releases Usage of ‘Flickr’ social networking photo site explodes! 32K hits;

Industry Analysts: Major analyst firms all published reports positive to neutral tone (44% positive, 28% neutral to positive, 28% neutral). Of the 21 reports published, Gartner published one with another expected; IDC published three reports.

Financial Analysts: All sell side analysts wrote at least one piece on UCS; 98% positive, Goldman Sachs “Conviction Buy List”

Employees: CEC Home Page Hits – 14,097 hits for CEC Feature, 11,225 hits Chambers Video —Roughly twice the traffic as the average VoD or podcast on CEC.

Executive Summary

Key themes: Positive and powerful impact of partnerships (open partner ecosystem); growing competition with HP/IBM; innovation & the concept of unified computing as a new approach; Cisco’s business model.

Balance: The press bias toward a “clash of the titans” focus and a limited market view was balanced with broader analyst commentary that positioned this as a major market transition.

Market Conditioning (Project Solstice): This new communications approach helped influencers digest the enormity of the transition, laid some significant groundwork for reporters and investors. Many references to Padma's blog and video in post-launch coverage.

Extend Momentum: Drumbeat focus, buzz platform, debate/dialogue is leading to continued dialogue with our influencers. The launch is a major milestone but opportunity to extend and truly frame this market transition.

Competition: Crisp outbound communication of the competitive landscape and our position with HP in the data center.

Integrated Communications: Financial/Industry Analysts Influencing Reporters

"The battle for the next-gen data centers will be competitive, and we view it as a key driver for tech...over the next two to three years," stated UBS analyst Nikos Theodosopoulos…."We expect Cisco to show how its unified communications approach for the data center will run as

one unified platform bringing together these different silos, allowing for lower cost of ownership, power utilization and improved performance," (NetworkWorld)

“The way you get high-performance data centers is through very tight integration between storage, computer and network,” Sam Wilson, an analyst at JMP Securities LLC in San

Francisco, said in an interview. “Cisco is entering a world where it historically hasn’t played.” (Bloomberg)

Yankee Group analyst Zeus Kerravala said that Cisco's vision of the data center could eventually shape a new era in consumer electronics products. "You'll be able to use a less

complex device to access more complex information and services," he said. "So it's the difference between buying a US$300 Netbook and a US$3,000 laptop…. Ultimately, it means

more content on more devices for more people." (ZDNet Asia)

Ken Dulaney, an analyst at market research firm Gartner Cisco’s competition against IBM and HP in a market in which they have little experience as a “huge move”. "Cisco had to make

this move to defend itself from HP who is moving into networking," he said. "But the challenge to make it successful will be significant.“ (RedOrbit)

"It's a bold move by Cisco," said Forrester analyst James Staten, who equated the new initiative to the company's bet on Voice over Internet Protocol, or VoIP, several years ago. (SJ

Merc)

Industry CEO TelePresence News Briefing

• Total TelePresence live attendees: 53

•Industry Analysts: 11

•Press: 35

•Financial Analysts/Investors: 7

•Total Cisco TV viewers: 832

•Live: 482

•Archive: 350 (As of March 23rd)

• TelePresence Locations:

•Bellevue, Boxborough, Houston , London, Munich, New York, Paris, San Francisco, San Jose, Toronto.

•Total TelePresence Segments:

• 40 Segments

Operation Team: Lorena Montes, Scot Southworth, Wasileh M Karaouni, Mike Nolan

Public Relations Results

Lead: Lee Davis

Media Highlights

280 global journalists briefed covering all major cities in every theater– Interviews with all top-tier business and trade publications,

including top bloggers in each theater via WebEx, TP, press events and 1:1 interviews

– Extensive messaging training for all global spokespersons in every theater – media slides created in collaboration with global teams

Phenomenal Customer Endorsement:“[Cisco has] forced the industry to think of another evolutionary path for the server…revisiting the current mode.…But there's no question that other [vendors] are capable and have the technical ability to do the kinds of things Cisco has done here. But the question is, where is the will and the motivation? Do they see the market that Cisco sees and do they see a risk to the product that they already offer in that new market opportunity? It's one thing to say you can accomplish all the functions of this unit by assembling these four boxes and layering this hunk of software on top; it's another to buy the unit with all of that done. It's a fully integrated system, it's a new architecture for delivering the functions that look familiar.” (Brian Doerr, CTO Savvis, in Computerworld)

Cisco UCS By the Numbers

March 14 - March 26:

– Total UCS Media Impact from launch 3.96 Billion; 98% positive, 2% negative

December 1 - March 26:

– Total UCS Media Impact from Solstice and launch 4.9 Billion; 98% positive, 2% negative

Compiled by Second OpinionTraditional online and print media onlyGlobal, English-languageDates: 12/1/2009 – 3/13/2009 (Solstice) 3/14/2009 – 3/26/2009 (Launch)

* Media impact multiplies the number of articles by the circulation of the publication and the prominence of the mention. The prominence is an algorithm that considers whether Cisco is mentioned in the headline, where it is first mentioned, and how many times it is mentioned in relation to total word count.

Cisco UCS Total Launch Media Impact

98% Positive; 2% negative

Media Impact: Top Business Press Coverage

Tone: 98% Overall Positive

Cisco’s News Dominated Global Trade Media

Global Media Coverage Features Cisco UCS

Global Collaboration: US and Canada

Joint Cisco corporate communications and CMO team created an unprecedented TelePresence media event with Cisco executives and its ecosystem of partners: Accenture, BMC, EMC, Intel, Microsoft, VMware.

13 TelePresence sites linked in 10 cities with 53 live attendees and 480 viewers via Cisco IPTV.

Over 232 articles to date

Over 70 one-on-one interviews with all the top business and trade press

Video interviews with TheStreet.com and Fox news

Radio Interview with MarketPlace

UK, France, Italy Germany participated in the global TelePresence media event with John Chambers

362 articles resulting from dozens of 1:1 interviews, CiscoTV and TelePresence Q&A sessions and press conferences.

Cisco’s news dominated the technology media agenda in Europe, including the most influential business, technology and channel publications. Highlights include:

CNBC Europe TV interviewed Chris Dedicoat, live on the 'Europe Tonight' show

BFM radio in France interviewed Laurent Blanchard

Global Collaboration: Europe Highlights

Emerging Markets: over 515 articles– Briefed 42 journalists in 15 countries

– Leveraged local and regional executive spokespersons with a creative mix of 1:1 press interviews, press conferences, round tables and TelePresence meetings to deliver the news.

APAC: Over 230 articles – Briefed over 120 journalists in 12

countries via 1:1 interviews, TelePresence press conferences and WebEx interviews, resulting

Japan: to launch on April 7 – Some preliminary coverage, stay tuned for more!

Global Collaboration: Emerging Markets and Asia

Global Headlines

Network World Asia, Singapore: Cisco enters server market with Unified Computing System

Financial Times, UK: Cisco Plans To Cross Over To Server Market

CBR, Pan-Europe: Cisco unveils long-awaited Unified Computing System

IT Pro, Japan: Cisco enters server market, announcing unified system for data centers

CIO UK: - Cisco aligns stars and moon for server push

Computer Weekly – UK; Cisco enters server market to remove virtualisation roadblocks

Business Press Headlines

Market Watch: Cisco Lifts Wraps On Push Into Data Centers

New York Times: Cisco Pushes Into Server Computer Market

Reuters: Cisco To Sell Servers Aimed At Data Centers

Wall Street Journal “Digits” Blog: Cisco’s Data Center Love Fest

Dow Jones: Networking Giant Cisco Takes Aim At Corporate Data Centers

CNBC: ‘Serv’ing Up New Blade Competition

CNET: Cisco’s Virtualization Push To Benefit Consumers

Bloomberg: Cisco Introduces Server Computers For Data Centers

Trade Press Headlines

Channel Insider: Cisco Begins Unified Computing Push

Computerworld: Cisco Launches Unified Computing Push With New Blade Server

CRN/Channel Web: Cisco Bets Big On Virtualization, Blade Servers

IT Jungle: The Data Center Is the Computer

Giga Om: Cisco’s Data Center Play Reinvents the Server

Network World: Cisco Busts Out Beyond Blade Servers With Unified Computing System

eWeek: Cisco Systems Launches Long-Anticipated Unified Computing System

Social Media Group ResultsSocial Media Group ResultsMetrics Timeframe 3/16-3/25Metrics Timeframe 3/16-3/25

Social Media Highlights

Cisco Hits Milestones with Strategic Social Web Engagements– 105 blog posts relating to Cisco business generated over 500 comments

– Level of engagement within Twitter community skyrockets– 455K impressions, 3100 Tweets

– Record high traffic for Cisco blogs

Platform blog: 18K+ page views, 13,500 visitors

Data Center blog: 16K page views, 10K visitors News@Cisco Online

– Usage of ‘Flickr’ social networking photo site explodes! 32K access landing page; previously, photos accessed from online press kits garnered less than 10 views per photo

– Record high traffic for (8) releases: 85K total views, 33K visitors

– Twitter is 4th most popular referring site to blogs and 7th to News@Cisco (up from 6th and 27th respectively)

News@Cisco OnlineContent Metrics8 press releases

- Total views 85K; 33K visitors- Most viewed/visited release:

Cisco Unleashes the Power of Virtualization with Industry's First Unified Computing System(60K views; 22K visitors)

6 times more views/ 3 times more visitors than ASR 1000 and most recent earnings release

1 Feature- 6K total views; 2K visitors

Top shared content: umbrella release shared 240 times. Highest number of sharing since start of Share This widget on News@Cisco

Multimedia: Video & Podcasts

YouTube- 10 videos; 5K streams 1 comment (positive)- Top video: EMC Chairman, President and CEO, Joe Tucci 1,300 streams

Videos posted to News@Cisco- 2 videos; 31K streams; 13K visitors- Top video: Unified Computing Vision: John Chambers on the Data Center Evolution22K views; 9,500 visitors

Podcasts posted to News@Cisco

- 2 podcasts; 2K streams; 1,300 visitors - Top podcast: Unified Computing Overview; Dave Lawler

Social Networking Site

Flickr added to News@Cisco in Jan. ’09

Prior to using Flickr, photos accessed via online press kits. Minimal hits—usually single digit pickup.

Results with Flickr are significantly more impactful; Flickr is resource for press

Most Popular Photo: Cisco Unified Computing System 5108 with 8 Cisco

UCS B-Series Blades

Flickr (15 photos)– Flickr landing page: 32K views – Click thru to individual photos: 8K

25% click thru to individual photos– Unified Computing System--most popular

photo viewed 2,500

Top 5 Search terms via Flickr page:ucs b-seriescisco ucs b-seriesucs b-series bladescisco ucs b-series bladesrob lloyd cisco

Cisco in the Blogosphere Coverage (3/16 – 3/20) 105 blog posts that generated over

500 comments – largest in Cisco’s launch history

Reaction from blog community cautiously positive; optimism that Cisco well positioned to lead Unified Computing market

While coverage highest on launch day, it tapered off on Thursday, focusing more on IBM’s rumored acquisition of Sun Microsystems

Most coverage focused on increased competition and acquisition activity in tech industry as a result of Cisco’s announcement

Blog comments slightly more negative and opinionated in tone, mostly due to ability to make posts anonymous

Blog comments peaked on Wednesday 3/18 (over 300) as a result of IBM’s rumored acquisition of Sun Microsystems which fueled even more speculation that Cisco could be a likely company to acquire Sun as well.

Day 1 Blog Coverage: 47 posts

Total Blog Coverage: 105 posts

Neutral: 75%

Positive: 13%

Negative: 12%

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Twitter Coverage (3/16 – 3/20)

BusinessWeek story, “Will Cisco’s Project California Rock The IT Sector?” most tweeted story, setting tone for conversations early in week

Conversations focused on competition, specifically with IBM and HP; continued through week with heavy emphasis on IBM’s potential acquisition of Sun Microsystems

Strong support that Cisco well-positioned in Unified Computing space

Most widely tweeted announcement for Cisco

Total Tweets: 3,139Positive: 5%

Negative: 5%

Neutral: 90%

Impressions: 455,000

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Cisco Blog Metrics

Platform blog – 18K+ page views, 13,500 visitors # blog comments = 3, Overall tone = Neutral-Positive

Data Center blog – 16K page views, 10K visitors# blog comments = 23, Overall tone = Positive

Compared to CES (Jan ’09) – DC blog page views up 412%, Platform blog page views up 500%

Most viewed post (3K) – Key Points on ‘Cisco Blade Servers’ or Unified Computing

Cisco Blog Traffic Sources

Platform blog - 46% of overall traffic (#visits) from referring sites– 1. tools.cisco.com – 17%

– 2. newsroom.cisco.com – 15%

– 3. cisco.com – 15%

– 4. twitter.com – 9%

– 5. stumbleupon.com – 5%

Data Center blog - 55% of overall traffic (#visits) from referring sites

– 1. cisco.com – 24%

– 2. tools.cisco.com – 14%

– 3. twitter.com – 9%

– 4. newsroom.cisco.com – 7%

– 5. friendfeed.com – 7%

28% of overall traffic from search engines

22% of overall traffic from search engines