Never short for words and often considered a business visionary despite bumps and bruises along the way in building Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO) into the world’s top networking company, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer John Chambers took to the world of blogs on Monday to launch his company’s latest marketing campaign.

“Tomorrow Starts Here.”

“It’s easy to take our connectedness for granted, isn’t it? We often don’t even think about all the innovation behind our connections, but it’s mind boggling when you actually consider just how much getting connected has revolutionized nearly every facet of life over the past two decades,” Chambers wrote. “Even more amazing is the fact that we’re just getting started. I like how [venture capitalist] Mary Meeker, in the most recent installment of her highly anticipated annual ‘Internet Trends’ presentation, described it as still being in ‘spring training.’

“It took us more than 20 years to get two billion people on the Internet, but estimates suggest the next two billion will connect to the network in less than half that time. And the growth of connected ‘things’ is even more incredible. Sometime around 2009, the number of things connected to the Internet surpassed the number of connected people, at which point we began to experience what some call the ‘Internet of Things.’

 

“There will be about 15 billion devices connected by 2015, and around 40 billion by 2020, according to the Cisco Internet Business Solutions Group. But despite all these connections, we estimate that more than 99 percent of all physical objects that may one day join the network are currently still unconnected. Think about that – we’ve only just begun to connect the unconnected. What will happen when a full one percent of things are actually connected? When 10 percent get connected?”

Last week, Chambers pitched analysts and investors about Cisco’s go forward strategy, talked about more acquisitions, hitting revenue targets and moving more into software as Internet opportunities grow.

In his blog, Chambers said he sees the net as becoming the “Internet of Everything” which he describes as “the intelligent connection of people, process, data, and things on the network. One important enabler of the Internet of Everything is the network intelligence that fuels the manageability, controllability and scalability required to support this incredible growth in connections.

“With each new person, process, piece of data, or thing that comes online, the connection possibilities between all these elements grows exponentially. The Internet of Everything makes all these connections more relevant and valuable. It’s not the act of getting connected – or even the number of connections – that creates the value. Rather, it’s the outcomes the connections make possible.”

While the Internet and dot com boom of the late 1990s sparked incredible economic growth and the commercializing of the Internet beyond most expectations, Chambers sees bigger times ahead.

“The Internet of Everything will create economic value as well, and we believe it represents vast opportunities for businesses that effectively adapt to take advantage of it. I often talk about market transitions – I believe this will be the biggest transition we’ve ever experienced, making the initial build-out of the Internet truly feel like ‘spring training.'”

And Cisco, he says, is positioned to be a major player as the net is built out.

“We have the innovation engine, the talent and experience, the open dialog with customers, the world’s best ecosystem of partners and resellers, and the broadest portfolio of industry-leading networking solutions, services, and business architectures to back it up. The truth is, as big data, cloud computing, BYOD and mobility, and a new breed of software applications continue to shape the foreseeable future, networks will require ever more intelligence – not less – in order to effectively cope with the increased complexity. Creating order out of chaos is what Cisco does best, and frankly, we’ve never seen more business opportunities than we do today.”

Of course, the Internet is larger than any one company – or country, he acknowledges.

“In the end … the Internet of Everything is bigger than Cisco – or any company, for that matter; it will require unprecedented cooperation between many companies and organizations. Ultimately, we believe that the success and impact of the Internet of Everything will be measured by the extent to which we’re able to harness it to benefit humanity. With this in mind, we couldn’t be more excited to see what the future holds. Tomorrow starts here.”

Cisco operates its largest campus outside its California headquarters in RTP.

[CISCO ARCHIVE: Check out 10 years of Cisco stories as reported in WRAL Tech Wire.]