Wednesday, May 4, 2011

Future clearer for Brocade than Cisco


Analyst expects upcoming quarters to hit mark but beyond that, uncertainty for one, clarity for another

Investment firm Oppenheimer & Co. has been checking with the channel again and expects share losses and profit uncertainty to show up in Cisco's Q3. Rival Brocade is expected to grow Ethernet and SAN revenue beyond its current second quarter. 
Both Cisco and Brocade will announce quarterly results in May.
Based on feedback from 36 channel partners in the US and Europe, Oppenheimer expects in-line results from Cisco but "competitive pressures" in all segments of its business: switching, routing, security, WLAN, application networking, etc. There's also lack of clarity going into Q4 on where profit margins are headed and the results and impact of recent restructurings, like that in the consumer business.

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