Just two weeks after disclosing plans to cut 5,500 workers as part of a pivot away from its traditional hardware focus, Cisco on Tuesday said it plans to buy two-year-old cloud-focused startup Container X.

The company was formed by engineers who had worked at Microsoft, VMware and Citrix.

Financial terms were not disclosed.

Container X is an emerging player in the so-called “container” space.

  • (Video: Watch an explanatory video about Container X at:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_4WYd_9MKs )

These virtual containers are an increasingly popular way of creating, deploying and managing applications in the cloud.

The move is seen as another part of Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins’ strategy to transform Cisco into more of a software company.

“Cisco is uniquely positioned to integrate the next generation data center with cloud-native and containerized environments that customers are demanding, all while still delivering advanced features such as security, analytics and management,” Rob Salvagno, head of corporate development for Cisco, explained in a blog post. “With ContainerX, Cisco is continuing to invest in innovative technology and talent to help our customers in their transition to cloud native architectures using containers.”

Read the full blog post at: https://blogs.cisco.com/news/cisco-announces-container-news-%E2%80%8E

Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO) has now made six acquisitions this year and 16th since Robbins became CEO last summer.

The tech giant operates one of its largest campuses in RTP.