Cisco revenue declines for fifth straight quarter, shares fall

(Reuters) - Cisco Systems Inc on Tuesday reported a decline in revenue for a fifth straight quarter, as enterprise clients spent less on its network infrastructure products for offices due to the rise of remote working.

The dour performance overshadowed a better-than-expected forecast for current-quarter revenue and sent the company's shares 4% lower in extended trading. The stock had risen nearly 8% last week ahead of the results.

Chief Financial Officer Richard Herren said on a call with analysts that the infrastructure platforms unit, whose sales fell 3% in the quarter, took the biggest hit from the COVID-19 pandemic.

The company's total revenue fell slightly to $11.96 billion in the second quarter ended Jan. 23, from $12.01 billion a year earlier. Analysts were expecting a figure of $11.92 billion, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.

However, the remote working trend boosted demand for the company's videoconferencing platform Webex, virtual private network AnyConnect and cybersecurity products.

Revenue from the company's services business rose 2% to $3.39 billion.

Cisco said it expects third-quarter revenue to increase between 3.5% to 5.5%, which implies a range of $12.4 billion to $12.64 billion compared with analysts' estimates of $12.35 billion.

(Reporting by Munsif Vengattil in Bengaluru; Editing by Aditya Soni)