The Rowan Era at Cisco Ends
Today, the Internet belched. The news first came from Cisco that Rowan Trollope “is taking the next step in his career and leaving Cisco to become CEO at another company effective May 3.” Soon after that came the press release from Five9: “has appointed Rowan Trollope as CEO effective May 3rd.” I am unaware of anyone that wasn’t surprised by the news.
Rowan hosted the Cisco Collaboration Summit just a few weeks ago and seemed on top of the world. Spark and Webex both got upgrades, the launch of the Webex Share, and many more announcements (see related research report). Rowan seemed engaged and excited. 
Honestly, it’s going to take me some time to sort this out. Why is he leaving Cisco? Why go to Five9? What is Accompany? Who is Amy Chang? How will this impact Cisco? How will this impact Cisco Collaboration Competitors? We may not have the facts yet, but we certainly have opinions and thoughts on these topics.
I reached out to Cisco and Five9 expert Zeus Kerravala to discuss the day’s news.