Today is a new day for all of us at Cisco, and I could not be more excited for our future. Under John's leadership over the past 20 years, we have changed the way the world works, lives, plays and learns. We're so well positioned in the market because of the vision, strategy and culture that John built, and we are all thankful for this. As I officially step into the CEO role today, I'm honored to lead what I believe to be the best-positioned company in our industry. I'd like to share with you why I am so confident, and how we will accelerate Cisco's leadership in the digital age.

Every customer knows that technology must be at the core of their business strategy to create and deliver unprecedented value as every person, process and thing in their organization and ecosystem connects. Each customer faces a fundamental decision: will technology simply enable, potentially differentiate, or fundamentally define their business strategy? This decision is at the heart of the digital transition that every country, city and company is undergoing, and we intend to be the most strategic partner for our customers during each stage of this transition.

In the digital world, data -and the insights from that data -will be the most strategic asset. It will be distributed across every part of our customers' organizations and ecosystems. The ability to secure, aggregate, automate, and draw insights from the data -with speed -will ultimately define success. For fifty years, the IT industry has been bringing data to the 'computer.' Now, we're bringing computing -with analytics, insights, and actions -to the data. Only Cisco, and only the network, can deliver the highly secure, distributed, and intelligent infrastructure and solutions required in today's highly dynamic digital world.

I am not the only one who sees the opportunity ahead for Cisco. Today, we welcome two amazing industry and thought leaders to Cisco's Executive Leadership Team (ELT). Zorawar Biri Singh is joining us as our SVP and Chief Technology Officer, Platforms and Solutions, and Kevin Bandy will serve as our SVP and Chief Digital Officer.

As I've said before, a diverse set of perspectives and experiences is important to me as we build Cisco's next chapter. We've looked at leaders from around the world, and I am convinced that we are adding two of the most strategic and innovative leaders to the Cisco team. Their creative thinking will make us even stronger.

As Cisco's CTO, Biri will further our success at anticipating customer and industry transitions, and define the technology strategy to stay ahead of the market. He is a visionary who will drive thought leadership around Cisco's long-term technology roadmap, platforms and architectures for the next era of digitization and beyond. Working closely with Pankaj Patel and Cisco's engineering and broader CTO community, he will set the foundation for our long-term investments. He will also work with Hilton Romanski and our strategy team to align our technology strategy with our business strategy and corporate development priorities. Having Biri in this role will drive greater clarity for our customers as they digitize everything that they do.

Kevin, as Cisco's Chief Digital Officer, will help us define our next generation digital strategy. We have always been the leader in leveraging Internet technologies to transform countries, cities and companies, and we will continue our leadership in the next wave of digitization. He will work with teams across Cisco to design a comprehensive vision for us, and our customers, to capture the true value of digitization by leveraging Cisco's broad portfolio of solutions and services. Rebecca Jacoby's Operations and IT teams will partner with Kevin to drive and execute on our digital strategy throughout the company to allow us to accelerate the incredible work that Operations and IT does in defining our own strategy.

With the addition of Biri and Kevin, I believe we have the best, and most passionate, leadership team in the industry with the right capabilities and values to lead us into the future.

We are a company that builds amazing teams, passionately drives our customers' and partners' success, and cares deeply about changing the world. Our culture of trust, respect, innovation, and winning is a great competitive advantage, and we are focused on building the most innovative employee experience so that our people are at their best.

I have believed in this company for over 17 years, and as I start today as Cisco's new CEO, I have never believed in us more. Every day, I'm inspired by our customers, partners and our teams -and what we make possible. What's ahead for Cisco is truly extraordinary and our time is now.