Business News sponsored by Vodacom Transformation of Work:

Cisco has announced it completed the acquisition of Splunk, setting the foundation for delivering unparalleled visibility and insights across an organization’s entire digital footprint.

The company explained that to thrive in the new digital era, organizations must connect and protect all that they do. They need to connect the people, places, applications, data, and devices that power their business while protecting their entire digital footprint from cybersecurity threats, downtime, and other critical business risks.

To this end, Cisco will bring the full power of the network, together with market-leading security and observability solutions, to deliver a real-time unified view of the entire digital landscape, helping teams proactively defend critical infrastructure, prevent outages, and refine the network experience.

“We are thrilled to officially welcome Splunk to Cisco,” said Chuck Robbins, Chair and CEO of Cisco. “As one of the world’s largest software companies, we will revolutionize the way our customers leverage data to connect and protect every aspect of their organization as we help power and protect the AI revolution.”

“Uniting Splunk and Cisco will bring tremendous value to our joint customers worldwide,” said Gary Steele, Executive Vice President, General Manager, Splunk. “The combination of Cisco and Splunk will provide truly comprehensive visibility and insights across an organization’s entire digital footprint, delivering an unprecedented level of resilience through the most extensive and powerful security and observability product portfolio on the market.”

Cisco will Power and Protect the AI Revolution

The company noted that the adoption and impact of AI are outpacing that of any technology introduction we have ever seen.

Effective use of the right data at massive scale is critical to enable the meaningful benefits of AI and help organizations drive outcomes never before possible. To truly reap the benefits of AI, organizations need the infrastructure to power it, the data to develop it, a security platform to protect it, and an observability platform to monitor and manage it in real time. Cisco will be able to do all four together.

“Cisco and Splunk is a transformative combination that will allow customers to do things that weren’t possible before,” said Stephen Elliot, Group Vice President, I&O, Cloud Operations, and DevOps at IDC. “With the close, Cisco has created a unique set of solutions for networking, security, and operations executives in the market. When you add that to their channel and AI investments, customers should be considering the higher levels of business value that can now be unlocked.”

“Accenture congratulates Cisco on the acquisition of Splunk," added Julie Sweet, Chair and CEO Accenture. "We have enjoyed long-term partnerships with both companies and look forward to the opportunities this collaboration presents to our clients in the future,” she continued.

Cisco explained that the combination of it and Splunk will provide customers with:

Better Security. A highly comprehensive security solution for threat prevention, detection, investigation, and response for organizations of any size, utilizing cloud, network, and endpoint traffic for unparalleled visibility.

Better Observability. A highly comprehensive full-stack observability solution for delivering amazing digital experiences across a multi-cloud hybrid environment.

Better Networking. A leading secure networking solution delivered on intelligent, resilient, and continually optimized network infrastructure.

Better AI. Cisco’s networking portfolio –– combined with enhanced security, full-stack observability, and a comprehensive data platform –– to empower customers to securely harness the power of AI throughout their organizations and applications.

Both companies stressed that their platform approach will ‘’help customers consolidate numerous point products—delivering better business outcomes and reducing costs.’’

Cisco and Splunk also bring together global developer and partner communities with extensive experience extending security, observability, and data platform capabilities with pre-packaged applications and solutions for customers.

Over the next several months, customers can expect a number of new product innovations across the portfolio with the integration of Splunk - for additional details please click here.  Many of these innovations and more will be showcased at Cisco Live, June 2-4, 2024, and .conf24, June 11-14, 2024.

Transaction Details
Under the terms of the agreement, Cisco acquired Splunk for $157 per share in cash, representing approximately $28 billion in equity value. The transaction is expected to be cash flow positive (excluding certain acquisition related and other items) and non-GAAP gross margin accretive in Cisco’s fiscal year 2025, and non-GAAP EPS accretive in fiscal year 2026. Additionally, it will accelerate Cisco's revenue growth and non-GAAP gross margin expansion.

Cisco and Splunk notified NASDAQ of the completion of the acquisition and requested that NASDAQ file a notification of delisting with the Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC") on Splunk’s behalf. Splunk’s common stock ceased trading on NASDAQ prior to the opening of trading today.