SAN JOSE, Calif., June 30, 2004 - As part of its ongoing effort to provide customers with greater service value, Cisco Systems® today introduced its new Global Services Alliance program. Through the Global Services Alliance program, Cisco® and key participating partners will be able to provide co-branded technical support services to customers requiring consistent information technology (IT) support capabilities on a global scale. This consistency in support is made possible by tightly integrating the Cisco SMARTnet® technical support offering and Cisco services' best practices with the partner's value-added IT services.

The Global Services Alliance program benefits Cisco customers with extensive IT resources distributed across multiple countries and will help them maximize the return on their IT investment and help ensure the resiliency of their IT infrastructure.

"Our global customers want partners that can provide flexible and consistent services worldwide. The Global Services Alliance allows Cisco and its channel partners to align service portfolios to a single complementary platform that provides greater flexibility and value to our shared end customers," said Wim Elfrink, senior vice president, Cisco Customer Advocacy. "Through this program, Cisco and its Global Alliance partners will provide a broad portfolio of end-to-end network services that address all aspects of issues with geography, technology, and applications through globally consistent and integrated IT-level support capabilities."

"The Global Services Alliance extends existing Cisco partner initiatives focused on creating global efficiency and consistency. This newest advance follows the recently announced Cisco Global Commerce Specialization, which recognizes partners that have a global presence and proven capability in providing consistent commerce and product logistics services to global customers. These developments further expand the opportunities for Cisco end users to make value-based choices from a variety of partners," said Paul Mountford, senior vice president, Cisco Worldwide Channels.

To be eligible for the Global Services Alliance program, interested Cisco partners must have achieved multinational certification in two of Cisco's three multiple country regions (Europe, Middle East, and Africa; Asia-Pacific and Americas International) and Cisco Gold Certified Partner status in the United States and Japan. In addition, Global Services Alliance partners will need to make ongoing investments, such as linking their internal support systems to Cisco's support systems, to facilitate an integrated services offering. Cisco soon will announce partners participating in the Global Services Alliance program.

About Cisco Systems

Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO), the worldwide leader in networking for the Internet, this year celebrates 20 years of commitment to technology innovation, industry leadership and corporate social responsibility. Information about Cisco can be found at http://www.cisco.com. For ongoing news, please go to http://newsroom.cisco.com.

Copyright© 2004, Cisco Systems, Inc. All rights reserved. Cisco, Cisco Systems, the Cisco Systems logo, and SMARTnet are registered trademarks of Cisco Systems, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the United States and certain other countries. All other trademarks mentioned in this document are the property of their respective owners. The use of the word partner does not imply a partnership relationship between Cisco and any other company.