To salute more than 15 years of its CCIE certification and to gain insight into what digital infrastructures will look like over the next five years, Cisco today announced the results of the most comprehensive end-customer survey ever conducted of the international CCIE community.

Commissioned as part of Cisco's overall 25th anniversary celebration, the research was conducted by Illuminas, a strategic research firm, to explore the unique perspective of some of the most knowledgeable and well-respected information technology professionals in the networking industry. The study reveals the top trends that are driving innovation, including virtualization, security and risk management, unified communications, video, and real-time collaboration. A total of 970 CCIE holders from 79 countries participated; their employers range from Fortune 500 enterprises to small- and midsize organizations representing a wide variety of industries.

Survey Highlights:

Rapid Adoption of Virtualization

• More than two-thirds of the CCIE holders surveyed said virtualization will be the top networking investment over the next five years as chief information officers continue to be hyper-focused on reducing IT costs.
• Organizations are increasingly adopting virtualization as an energy-, space- and cost-saving measure. A holistic and comprehensive virtualization strategy can provide a significant competitive advantage to organizations by increasing operational efficiency and simplifying management.
• CCIE holders expect energy efficiency in the data center to be the top green networking initiative impacting networks over the next five years.

Additional information about the Cisco CCIE program and complete survey results are available at: https://learningnetwork.cisco.com/