Cisco as a company can't do the kind of "out of the box" R&D that's necessary for significant innovation. When Cisco wants something truly new they go acquire a outside company.
That said they've done a fairly good job of growing those companies within their area (Aeronet as Enterprise, Linksys as Home) through incremental improvements.
This may be intentional behavior on Cisco's part to control their exposure to large project failures. IIRC there've been cases where Cisco employees couldn't get support to develop something new so they quit and once Cisco saw their success they were acquired back in.
Cisco has the highest market share in wireless and it is Cisco's innovation in wireless that's keeping it ahead of Ruckus, Aruba and Motorola. Don't understand the conclusion that Cisco can't do "out of the box" R&D, at least in wireless.
I think what he was trying to say is that Cisco's R&D efforts are largely focused on refining the wireless stuff that it already does, if it wants something radically new AND that something is being done already it's easier to just buy the company and their research instead of spinning up a new R&D effort to reinvent the wheel.
That said they've done a fairly good job of growing those companies within their area (Aeronet as Enterprise, Linksys as Home) through incremental improvements.
This may be intentional behavior on Cisco's part to control their exposure to large project failures. IIRC there've been cases where Cisco employees couldn't get support to develop something new so they quit and once Cisco saw their success they were acquired back in.