Insiders are looking at sales president Rob Lloyd as the top candidate to become the Cisco's next CEO.
If history can predict the future, this isn't good news for Lloyd.
Lloyd, a 17-year Cisco veteran, is the guy that Cisco's top resellers say has the inside track, reports CRN.
Earlier this month, Cisco shifted around responsibilities among its top executives, with Lloyd nabbing more responsibility over Cisco’s massively important engineering efforts.
He's been running the global sales organization for years and is particularly known for his international experience. He was president of Cisco's Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) unit for four years.
Cisco CEO John Chambers has been talking about his retirement for years. But last month he got tongues wagging again when he said he was staying on for two to four more years. He said the company had 10 internal candidates in mind to take over as CEO. Chambers has been CEO since 1995, one of the longest executive tenures at the top of a tech company.
In addition to Lloyd, other names mentioned were Chuck Robbins, senior vice president of the worldwide sales; Edzard Overbeek, senior vice president of Cisco's global services; and Gary Moore, Cisco's COO and the man credited with its global restructuring. Moore and Robbins also got promotions earlier this month.
But the thing is, Chambers has repeatedly pushed back his retirement plans. In 2007, Chambers said he planned to stay on for three to five more years. That would have meant he retired in 2012. Now in 2012, he's committed to two to four more years.
Meanwhile, the front-runners for the CEO office don't always stick around. Back in 2007, after the last retirement announcement, chief development officer Charles Giancarlo left. Flash forward to June, when the latest heir apparent, chief strategy officer Ned Hooper, left.
"Anyone who challenges Chambers is gone," one former Cisco executive recently told Business Insider.
Please follow SAI: Enterprise on Twitter and Facebook.
Join the conversation about this story »
