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Alan Cohen

Vice President

Global Public Sector & Industry Solutions

As vice president of global public sector and industry solutions, Alan S. Cohen is responsible for building and executing integrated global marketing strategies, solutions and programs to drive maximum relevance and adoption of Cisco’s technology portfolio for key customers in government, health care, education, financial services, manufacturing and retail.

Cohen has more than 20 years of leadership experience breaking new ground in multi-billion dollar markets in the communications and software industries. He is recognized as an expert in the areas of collaboration, business transformation and the impact of technology and social networking in companies and societies. At Cisco, he serves on the company’s Global Public Sector Board, Health Care Board and Private Sector Board.

Prior to assuming his current position, Cohen was vice president of marketing for enterprise and mid-market solutions, and before that led the Mobility Solutions group, where he was responsible for guiding adoption of Cisco’s unified wireless portfolio and developing the applications and services that make mobility a leadership initiative at Cisco. He also led product management for Cisco’s Wireless Business Unit, launching the Cisco Unified Architecture and building it to a leading position in the industry generating more than $1 billion in sales.

Before joining Cisco, Cohen served as vice president of marketing and product management at Airespace, a pioneering wireless LAN systems company at the center of the wireless explosion before it was acquired by Cisco. Prior to joining Airespace, Cohen was a founding team member of the Internet Business Solutions Group at Cisco, bringing vertical expertise and Internet best practices to Global Fortune 500 companies and government leaders. Cohen was an e-commerce pioneer at IBM launching some of its first internet-driven products, including IBM World Distributor, World Avenue, and net.Commerce. He also launched IBM’s first sport league partnerships with the NHL and NBA. He also served at U.S. West as director of corporate strategy and at Coopers and Lybrand as a strategy consultant. Earlier assignments included the Energy Information Administration and the Congressional Research Service.

Cohen currently serves on the board of directors of Violin Memory Inc, a provider of fast, scalable memory appliances. He also serves on the advisory board of MobileIron, a leader in mobile device security and management.

Cohen holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from State University of New York at Buffalo, a Master of Arts degree from American University’s School of International Service, and a Master of Business Administration degree from New York University, Leonard N. Stern School of Business.