The government's smart city push has Cisco really excited. CNBC-TV18’s Shereen Bhan spoke to company's president of India and SAARC nations Dinesh Malkani where he said Cisco is betting big on India and believes that emerging markets are key to its growth strategy. Cisco sees significant opportunities due to digital India and the smart cities push.



Below is verbatim transcript of the interview:

Q: What is driving you towards India?

A: I am personally very excited because I can see that India has the potential and will become one of the most digitised countries of the world. We have a young population, we have a huge mobile proliferation, we have the desire of the government and the vision laid out to get every home connected with broadband, we have businesses that understand the disruption that is happening.

It is starting to come together. I am seeing that with customers and the manufacturing space, I am seeing that with banks, e-commerce companies, I am seeing that in government conversations around, we have got to get it done.

Yesterday, we did an announcement together with JD in Jaipur which was a live example of what are the possibilities when smart city projects start to roll out.

Q: Let us take the Jaipur example because Ajmer has been identified as one of the first few smart cities that the government intends to focus on. You are working with the Rajasthan government. What has been the experience so far in order to just get the nuts and bolts together?

A: Firstly, I am quite encouraged by the fact that the vision is there. The vision to get better services to citizens in cities is definitely there. The future of competition will not be between countries, it will be between cities as you attract Foreign Direction Investment (FDI). That is being well understood by them, projects like Jaipur, we did the safe city project in Navi Mumbai a couple of years ago, we have done that in Lucknow just about six months back.

I can see the momentum and I can see that this is top of mind discussion with urban planners, with Chief Ministers. They want to smarten their cities, they want to make them safer, get traffic under control, provide free wifi services, so good momentum, small steps, long way to go.

Q: Since we are talking about change and disruption let me ask you about Cisco because you have seen a change as far as John’s roll is concerned after two decades now. What does that mean in terms of operations and what does that mean in terms of where you go from here as a company?

A: John has been a fantastic leader.

Q: As far as India, I know he has been bullish on India for the longest time.

A: I must admit in 20 years he took the company from a billion dollars to USD 47 billion. He has obviously provided phenomenal leadership.

Chuck Robbins has been with us for a long time – 16-17 years, very operationally focused, has picked up along the way a lot of the elements of for example India, it has been very important for John equally important for Chuck. In early discussions we have had he is not going to change anything down. In fact if anything he is very bullish on this market.

This is a transition that has been extremely well handled. John is going to continue to be the executive chairman, Chuck is going to be the CEO, transition has been managed well. I think from an India standpoint we love the growth that is coming out of this market for us.

Q: Give a number to the growth that India is going to contribute as far as that USD 47 billion number is concerned? Is it the top performing?

A: It is one of the top performing markets right now. If you look at the last one year every quarterly announcement John has called out that India has been doing well and continues to do well in terms of the growth opportunities that are there. I think as the country digitises this is going to be a great opportunity.