Cisco Acquires Video CMS Company
Financial terms were not disclosed. ExtendMedia, founded in 1991, is based in Newton, Mass., but most of its employees are based in Toronto. According to Cisco, the majority of the ExtendMedia team will join Cisco's Service Provider Video Technology Group, while ExtendMedia's sales and professional services teams will become part of Cisco's Sales and Advanced Services organizations. ExtendMedia's CMS software itself will be integrated into Cisco IP video offerings.
Cisco expects the deal to be completed in the first half of its fiscal 2011, which began on Aug. 1.
"As the video market transitions and consumers expect multi-screen engagement, service providers are enhancing their infrastructure to manage and deliver video to any device while providing a rich user experience," said Enrique Rodriguez, senior vice president and general manager of Cisco's Service Provider Video Technology Group, in a statement.
No further details on the acquisition were available Thursday. With the pickup, Cisco extends an acquisition streak that's gone more or less unabated for nearly two decades.
The networking titan has acquired more than 80 companies since 2000 alone, and some of its most significant -- including Flip maker Pure Digital, and also Tandberg, which it completed in April -- have been directly related to video.
Cisco CEO John Chambers and many of Cisco's top sales, marketing and channel executives are continuing to push video as a major play for channel partners, and also a key piece of its consumer strategy. According to Cisco, Internet traffic is expected to grow by more than four times in the next four years, and some 90 percent of that traffic will be video-based.