Cisco Aims to Buy BNI

Cisco announced its intent to acquire privately held BNI Video. Headquartered in Boxborough, MA, BNI supplies service providers with two major video products that offer video back-office and content delivery network (CDN) analytic capabilities. The acquisition is intended to advance the capabilities of Cisco's Videoscape TV platform, which is designed to allow service providers to deliver video to any device over any IP network. Comcast and Time Warner Cable were early investors in BNI, along with Cisco.Upon the close of the acquisition, BNI Video employees will be integrated into Cisco's Service Provider Video Technology Group. Under the terms of the agreement, Cisco will pay approximately $99 million in cash and retention-based incentives in exchange for all shares of BNI Video. The acquisition is expected to be complete in the second quarter of Cisco's fiscal year 2012.