Cisco’s ‘famed’ product development team quits in ‘messy shakeup’

A reorganization disclosed last week among top management at Cisco apparently didn’t sit well with what the Wall Street Journal calls the “famed product development team” at the tech giant. the four execs are quitting.

“Mario Mazzola, Prem Jain, Luca Cafiero and Soni Jiandani—a team dubbed MPLS after the initials of their first names—became wealthy by forming product-development,” noted The Journal’s Don Clark. The four are leaving, the newspaper said, citing an “apparent disagreement” with their new roles.

Tech news site Recode called the departures the end to “a messy shakeup with hints of an internal power struggle nearing an end.” Recode first reported the reassignments.

Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins has implemented massive leadership and organizational changes across the company since replacing John Chambers last summer. Chambers is now executive chairman.

“Robbins appears to have been blindsided by the resignations,” Recode reported.

The MPLS team were renowned for having direct access to Chambers, even as Robbins took over.

IDG News Service reported that it “saw” an internal memo from Robbins that said the four were leaving as of June 17. Robbins cited “a disconnect regarding roles, responsibilities and charter” linked to the changes announced last week.

The four started numerous ventures, such as Andiamo Networks, Nuova Systems and Insieme Networks, which were later folded back into Cisco.

“The four resigned after Cisco announced the formation of the Networking & Security Business Group, which will handle engineering for routing, switching and security products, the memo said,” IDG reported.

“David Goeckeler, a 16-year Cisco veteran, leads the group. Starting June 17, the Insieme business unit will also become part of it.”

Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO) operates one of its largest corporate campuses in RTP.