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Humanizing Technology:
Cisco Puts "Green" Lights on the Information Highway
A Green Technology Interview with Laura Ipsen
by Racquel Palmese
Started by a small group of computer scientists from
Stanford University, Cisco Systems,Inc., has been busy wiring the world
for technology and developing Internet Protocol (IP)-based networking
technologies for over two decades.
Now the company is poised to solve
some of the world's trickiest environmental challenges. Laura Ipsen, Cisco's
vice president of Global Policy and Government Affairs, works with
governments worldwide piloting programs that utilize technology and
networking to achieve their green initiatives. In this wide-ranging
interview with Green Technology Magazine, Ipsen takes us into a
future greened by advanced, "humanized" networking and tailored
information technology. It is a future that is rapidly becoming
present-time reality, as these new technologies are being tested in cities
around the world. Along with a passion for technology, she is also a
strong proponent of gender equity issues. She discusses why women are
inspired to take leadership on environmental issues and the importance of
attracting girls to math, science and technology.
Cisco
describes itself as a global leader for networking. What does that mean,
especially in terms of today's environmental challenges?
Cisco has grown from a box company of routers and switches into
a company addressing how the future of communications is going to work.
We are about using the network as a platform to change all of life's
experiences - the way that we work, live, play and learn. The company
has grown globally, building network-based solutions that drive what
companies do, how governments are transforming, and, increasingly, how
small businesses and individuals can use technology and empower themselves.
Our whole next generation campaign of the "human network at work,"
means that technology becomes more human and lifelike in real time.
We're seeing this next wave that is based both on the network's
intelligence and on the human network and the power of collaboration.
It's really through this network that people around the world are able
to connect and collaborate in new ways. That's how we define the human
network at work.
What does this mean in terms of someone working towards green
government?
It's about saying we have a network and technology that enable us
to get access to information and content. One of the challenges is that
there's so much out there. How can it become more personal? If my
interests are about green issues, how do I use the network to educate
myself about the environment? How do I use the network to find other
people who want to work on green issues in my community? Technology
itself isn't warm until you engage with it, and then it becomes more human.
Take it to a high level on green. The best way for us to address
climate change is really the power of innovation and collaboration.
The human network makes that possible. A community may have an
environmental challenge, but the people in the community may not be able
to solve the problem. The power of using technology to collaborate with
the best experts around the world to get access and visibility to issues
is what we think will solve those challenges, and, indeed, the biggest
challenges in the world. On an issue like climate change, you can use
technology to collaborate so you have the best scientists, government
officials - a combination of the public and private sectors - coming
together to solve big issues. That's where the network becomes human.
It changes the experience; it creates new pathways and opportunities for
people to address issues that typically have been very silo'd.
If you are an official in a small city and want to adopt a green plan
but you don't know where to start, you can go out on the Internet and
search for green mandates for cities and come up with lots of information.
But how do you create a roadmap adapted to your needs? It sounds like
what you're talking about is the next level, where they could actually
find other people to collaborate with.
Yes. It's not just finding content. It's leveraging the technology to
personalize what you do. For example, a sleeper issue in climate change
may be water. How are we possibly going to address all the water issues
around the world? It may be that there are a million ideas out there that
could become a knowledge base. But the only way to collect those ideas
is through the power of collaboration and a network. Having a one-way,
network-based interface and e-business isn't enough. It's really about
how disparate groups can actually connect together to take on the top
challenges. We're seeing that in action at the government level with the
Connected Urban Development partnership, which is about building a global
community of connected cities.
Would you give us an overview of this initiative?
As part of our participation in the Clinton Global Initiative, we
made the Connected Urban Development partnership commitment to establish
three pilot cities to explore new technology opportunities that would have
an impact on that city's carbon footprint and its green objectives. It
was really through the power of technology and collaboration between the
government and the private sector that we created a number of new
opportunities and innovations around green and sustainable cities.
We have three pilot cities -Amsterdam, San Francisco and Seoul - and we
have made an initial commitment of $15 million. Out of those we have grown
several innovations that really are a showcase for others to learn from
about how to use technology.
In the case of San Francisco we have a Wi-Fi bus that we hope will
create new incentives and opportunities for people to take public
transportation. That was the goal of Mayor Newsom, who said he wanted to
make his buses more green, to use a technology infrastructure to do
diagnostics about their performance, to track where they are in the city
to help alleviate traffic congestion, and to allow people to communicate
using Wi-Fi on the bus.
We are working in public-private partnerships with the mayors of
these three cities. We just engaged another four cities to ascertain what
their key challenges are on the environment and how technology can play a
role. This is in terms of traffic congestion, creating Smart Work Centers,
and leveraging new technologies. An example would be using GPS
(Global
Positioning Systems) to get people personalized travel assistance that
gives information about roadwork and traffic congestion with real time
monitoring so they can make smart decisions about their commutes. Through
collaboration with the cities using these technologies, we are finding
sustainable models for them to be more green.
What types of projects are you doing in Amsterdam?
In Amsterdam, we're working on developing what we call Smart Work Centers.
These are centers that we are developing with local partners in real
estate and with the city's development organizations. Smart Work Centers
are in the rings around the city, outside the city center, where people
can work remotely in a professional work environment with access to
broadband and other technology, such as
unified communications and
TelePresence. This creates the
opportunity for employees to either work in the range of a city, or to
time-shift their work so they can go in early in the morning, get their
meetings and other work accomplished, and then commute into the city if
they have a critical meeting to attend. The neat thing is that a lot of
the real estate that's being used in this situation is buildings that
were vacant on the fringes of the city. So this is giving an in-the-city
experience without really being there and then really helping on some of
the massive traffic congestion issues that the city has.
We're very optimistic that they can measure the impact of these Smart Work
Centers in terms of GHG (greenhouse gas) reduction. It's well underway, and we're
developing multiple sites.
What will the next generation of technology look like for green cities?
We're developing new technologies and architectures around traffic
mitigation and environmental dashboards to help cities develop tools to
track their carbon footprints. This is a big challenge for cities.
For example, many European cities are making carbon reduction commitments,
and the biggest challenge is to make sure they can do the actual daily
carbon footprint measurements with a tracking system. They need to see
what the impact is in terms of reducing GHG emissions that when they make
investments in renewables or change some of their traffic processes.
Those are some of the things we're exploring in our next generation of
technology. The goal of this is to develop pilots that will be replicable,
using an intelligent network and a platform to share what we've learned as
best practices so these types of innovations can be replicated in other
cities. We were proud when, a few months ago, the
European Commission recognized the Cisco
Connected Urban Development program as a best practice of innovation for
sustainable cities.
Do you think that what you're doing in San Francisco can be replicated
throughout the state?
Absolutely. Obviously having a very strong leader on green issues in Mayor
Newsom helps and gives the program a lot of visibility. It's important to
work with cities with strong leaders, a committed government body and also
a committed CIO. It's really a leadership issue to make the type of
investments in changes and to implement the technologies. In San Jose
(where Cisco is headquartered), Mayor Reed is very progressive on
environmental issues. We are working with the city to show them what we're
doing in San Francisco to see how we can replicate some of the business
models in San Jose. We think this can easily scale in many of the cities.
Who do you work with to put these partnerships together?
Initially we started out on our own and through the Clinton Global
Initiative invested $15 million spread across multiple cities. One of
the things we're finding as we work on the issues is that more companies
not only approach us, but they approach the city with ideas about
utilizing technology effectively in other areas of traffic management
other forms of transportation. We provided the seed money, and the goal
is to create enough momentum that it attracts
other consultants or businesses that have other ideas. We also
have been working with MIT on developing new technology, so we have a
partnership with them as part of our Connected Urban Development
strategy.
Besides strong leadership at local levels, what else can government do
to help move along this type of partnership?
Government needs to set goals and priorities to decide what's important
for their cities. Leadership is crucial, because even in San Francisco, which
is a very green city, the types of investments that you might have to make
in infrastructure and technology are things that are the decisions of
policymakers and appropriators, so it is important that everyone is onboard with the strategy.
You also focus on technological aspects of green building. Would you
explain that?
It's about using an intelligent network, having a Wi-Fi or wireless
enabled building and tying that technology back into things like heating
and cooling and water usage to create more sustainable opportunities for
existing buildings. We are addressing how technology is actually merged
with things like LEED (green building certification), so that the way you
design a building leverages technology to achieve the highest level of
LEED certification.
Where are you putting your focus right now?
We're developing a vision for the future of Connected Urban Development.
In 2008 we engaged four new cities, all in Europe - Birmingham, Hamburg,
Lisbon and Madrid - primarily because there is so much momentum in Europe
at the city level, and the mayors are very active. Many of the mayors are
making commitments for their cities on their greenhouse gas reductions.
Do we have a way to go to catch up with the Europeans on this?
Yes, but we should be optimistic because we have Governor Schwarzenegger, who
has been extremely progressive with things like AB32 and is really setting the tone for the rest
of the states across the country. I think we have an opportunity with this
governor to leverage his support of innovation to solve a lot of
challenges. He's been very active in engaging the technology community to
understand the power of innovation at every level when it comes to climate issues
for the state and the commitments we're making on greenhouse gas
reductions.
On a more personal note, as vice president of Global Policy and
Government Affairs for Cisco, can you give us a snapshot of what your
average day looks like?
As a mother of three, nothing in my life is average or balanced. What's
really fun about leading Global Policy and Government Affairs, and also as
the executive sponsor of gender diversity at Cisco and co-chair of our Eco
Board, is that I get to collaborate on issues with people across the company,
and externally with governments. In any one day I could be doing a
TelePresence meeting to work on a coaching and mentoring program that
we're developing on technology for women, or hosting 100 ambassadors from
around the world talking about green technology and the power of
innovation. I might be preparing my CEO for a political meeting, engaging
my team over TelePresence on how we are going to collaborate in the future
and using a Web 2.0 model to track our networking with government
officials worldwide.
We're a company just shy of 66,000 and we use the technology to access
people around the world to get our jobs done. No one day is average but
what's exciting for me now is that I have an ability to connect what I do
on public policy, what I do with governments around the world, to green
issues and to issues that are important to gender diversity. The human
network and social networking is creating connections and opportunities in
a different way today.
How big is your team?
My team itself is right around 25 globally. This morning I did a
performance review for the person that works for me in India. More broadly,
the team that I work with and manage through the Eco Board and
our Green Taskforce includes hundreds of people that I work on
strategic initiatives with.
You are a big supporter of gender equity and especially supportive of
young women getting into the fields of science and technology. Why is this
so important to you?
We have a group within Cisco that focuses on getting girls into
technology. We're really trying to change the branding and imaging of what
technology jobs look like. It's not the pocket protector stuff that it
used to be. We trying to get more girls in technology to hopefully
increase the pipeline a lot earlier.
When I talk to other women who are doing this, everyone has a personal
story about what got them into green and the environment. I don't think
women are doing this because they see it as a big career opportunity, but as an opportunity for leadership and
something that's meaningful. For me
it was when my son came home from school and had written a report about
why the polar bears are losing their home. He said, "Mommy, what are we
going to do about this?" That really got me thinking that we can do
something with the technology. It just ended up being the right time for
me. I raised my hand. Part of what women need to do is when they see a
compelling opportunity as it relates to green and the environment is to do
something, to raise their hands and take the opportunity make a
difference. That's where I really see women having a huge impact.
When I started Cisco's Eco Board, which is really the leadership group
that drives the company's green agenda, I would say the majority of people
who sent me emails asking what they can do to help were women.
What would you like to say to those working in green government,
especially women?
The leadership in Sacramento, including people like Susan Kennedy and
Secretary Rosario Marin, all great leaders on
environmental issues, my message would be to keep up the good work. This
is a state where women are passionate about green. We're making a
difference, and we really can connect our green goals back to what our
personal goals are. I think these are the women out there who are
really going to create the change for the future.
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