- Cisco is instituting a mandatory work from home policy for many of its 75,000 or so employees around the world over coronavirus fears.
- The policy affects Cisco's main campus in San Jose, California, as well as several of its other offices around the world - including San Francisco, New York City, and all of Washington State. It also extends internationally, to offices in countries including China, Italy, South Korea, and Australia.
- Cisco has not released information about any confirmed cases on its campus - but last week, it shut down one of its buildings after it learned that a worker was exposed to the coronavirus.
- Cisco says that it's well-positioned to move to make a temporary move to remote work - it makes secure networking products, and is also the proprietor of business videoconferencing tool WebEx, which it says has only grown more popular amid the coronavirus outbreak.
- The company says that employees not directly affected by the policy are still allowed to work from home at their own discretion.
- Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.
Networking giant Cisco has issued a mandatory two week work from home policy for most of its employees around the world, particularly in the areas where there are a concentrated number of cases of COVID-19, the coronavirus disease, the company confirmed to Business Insider.
More specifically, Cisco says that this new work from home policy applies to its main campus in San Jose, California, as well as its offices in San Francisco, New York City, and all of Washington state. It also extends to international employees in China, South Korea, Italy, Perth, Australia, and Kuala Lumpur.
That includes its main campus in San Jose, California, the company confirmed, where many of its 39,000 US employees work. Cisco has about 75,000 employees worldwide.
"The safety and wellbeing of our employees, partners, customers, and the communities in which we work is our highest priority. We have decided to take proactive and precautionary measures, including a mandatory work from home policy for specific locations where there are a concentrated number of cases. All other Cisco employees are welcome to work from home if they feel more comfortable. We believe this is the right decision as we learn more details about the virus, new testing capabilities, and steps we can take to remain healthy," a spokesperson said.
Cisco has not released information about any confirmed cases on its campus but it did confirm to Business Insider that last week, it shut down one of its buildings after it learned that a worker was exposed to the coronavirus. Cisco's San Jose campus is enormous, with over 30 buildings including a state-of-the art healthclub and its own medical center.
According to the Santa Clara County Public Health department, where San Jose is located there have been 37 cases of the virus either confirmed or suspected and under investigation as of Sunday, with the number rising daily. The state of California as of Wednedsay has so far confirmed 157 cases and two deaths. Another over 10,000 people are self-monitoring. Santa Clara is one of a handful of counties in the state at risk for community transmission, the department says - which is to say, it's spreading locally, and not just via people who have recently traveled.
Santa Clara County is now also requiring that conferences and other mass gatherings over more than 1,000 people be cancelled.
Cisco is well-prepared
Interestingly, Cisco is well-equipped to handle a workforce of tens of thousands of employees working for home because it makes the networking and videoconferencing technology to support such an effort. This includes secure WiFi products, as well as its flagship WebEx videoconferencing software, which the company is now allowing others to try at no charge for three months or to expand their usage for free. It also makes videoconferencing hardware, especially for conference rooms.
"As you'd expect we use our collaboration, networking and security technology to allow our employees to work remotely. We have done this for years and working remotely is deeply engrained in our culture," the spokesperson says.
Even externally, the company is seeing usage of WebEx skyrocket every week in Japan, Singapore, China, South Korea, Italy and across Europe. Cisco tells us that signups for WebEx in the Europe, Middle East, and Africa sales region have jumped 211% since the outbreak was first reported.
Last week, Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins also promised that Cisco's hourly workforce would continue to get paid during the coronavirus outbreak, including those vendors who work for outside contractors.
Get the latest Cisco stock price here.