Without much fanfare or self-congratulations, networking giant Cisco Systems has become one of the top contributors to the Linux kernel and an active contributor to the broader open source community.

It's a message that Cisco (NASDAQ: CSCO) isn't boasting about yet, but was willing to discuss with InternetNews.com. Cisco is the world's largest networking vendor and a technology juggernaut that is seeing the value in using and contributing to open source.

For example, Cisco is one of the top contributors to Linux, according to a recent Linux Foundation study.

While Cisco uses and produces proprietary software and hardware, the firm is actively participating in open source development efforts on a number of fronts. Cisco's open source participation ramp up comes as it expands its product lines like the Nexus, which benefit from Cisco's Linux efforts.

"The benefits of open source are really clear to all the executives I work with that report all the way up to [CEO] John Chambers," Cisco engineer Roland Dreier told InternetNews.com. "There is no question that open source is a key part of a modern engineering organization. As budgets get tighter, I think that open source will be one of the last things we would retreat from, since we see such huge benefits from the participation that we have now."