Cisco says it agrees to pay $1.4B for Jasper, a platform to connect Internet-of-Things devices
Ron Miller / TechCrunch :
Context & Ripple Effects
Cisco's $1.4B agreement for Jasper is its largest move yet into IoT, buying the connectivity-management layer that sits between connected devices and cellular carriers rather than another piece of networking hardware. It lands in the middle of an unusually active 2016 M&A stretch: weeks later Cisco paid $260M for cloud management software provider CliQr, and by June it had signed a deal with IBM to run Watson AI on its edge routers.
The through-line is a company built on selling boxes deliberately accumulating subscription software: the Jasper platform, the CliQr cloud tooling, and eventually SaaS monitoring via ThousandEyes and optics via Acacia Communications.
First-order effects
- IoT device makers and their carrier partners get a single Cisco-owned control point for activating, managing, and billing cellular-connected devices, folding Jasper's platform into Cisco's sales channel.
Second-order effects
- The IBM partnership to embed Watson in Cisco edge routers gives the newly acquired IoT base an analytics story at the network edge, tying connectivity management to compute where the data lands.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds — CliQr, ThousandEyes, Acacia after Jasper — Cisco's revenue mix keeps tilting toward recurring software and services, with each acquisition adding a subscription layer on top of the installed hardware footprint.
The trend: Cisco is converting its hardware-installed base into a software-subscription business, with IoT connectivity as the anchor workload.