Cisco to End 'SA' Brand

By Todd Spangler -- Multichannel News, 2/5/2007

Cisco Systems plans to rebrand all the products under its Scientific Atlanta subsidiary with the Cisco name within the next year.

Initially, Cisco is putting the parent company's name on Internet Protocol TV set-tops but eventually will rebrand all of Scientific Atlanta's lines as Cisco products, a process likely to happen in the next nine to 12 months, said Wilson Craig, manager of public relations for Cisco's service-provider segment.

Cisco hasn't determined yet whether Scientific Atlanta will continue to operate as a subsidiary after the rebranding process is completed or whether it will be merged into Cisco's service provider unit, Scientific Atlanta director of public relations Sara Stutzenstein said.

Cisco completed its $6.9 billion acquisition of SA, which has been one of the cable industry's top equipment suppliers for three decades, in February 2006. Scientific Atlanta, which makes cable set-top boxes and other voice and data gear, posted $584 million in sales for the quarter ended Oct. 28, 2006.

Based in Lawrenceville, Ga., Scientific Atlanta was founded in 1951 by a group of engineers from the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Before it began catering to the nascent cable-television industry in the early 1970s, SA manufactured a diverse range of products, including plastic-injection-molded packaging.