????杰仕瑞?烏拉爾的職業生涯起步于網絡領導者思科系統公司(Cisco Systems)，2008年離開后不久，她加入了一家由太陽微系統公司(Sun)創始人安迪?貝托謝姆發起的新公司，隨后還加入了其他幾家公司。最近接受《財富》( Fortune)記者亞當?拉辛斯基采訪時，烏拉爾暢談了最積極在思科公司學到的知識，以及她的新公司阿里斯塔網絡(Arista Networks)與這位老東家之間的競爭等話題。下面是她的自述。

????2008年，阿里斯塔公司有30名工程師，正準備推出產品。2008年5月份離開思科后，我休整了一個夏天，利用這段時間評估了一下在清潔技術和社交網絡領域就職的可能性，但最終還是選擇重新做我的老本行。

????這家公司流淌著許多思科的基因，因為思科是最大的網絡巨頭。業界人士據此認為我們以后肯定會被思科收購。我們相信，我們正在打造一家獨立的公司，但這種信念很難被外人理解。我認為我們現在就是這樣一家公司，但在當時，這樣的形象還不夠清晰。我們的目標和意圖并不是被思科收購。我們的確希望建立一家擁有獨立生存能力的公司。讓我們非常引以為傲的是，阿里斯塔能夠開發出偉大的技術，提供一流的客戶體驗，出色和卓越的服務，同時為客戶提供他們所期待的裂變性解決方案。

????我們深信我們將提供裂變性技術，這一點毫無疑問。但我認為，真正讓我們非常興奮的是，客戶的購買行為出現了一種裂變。許多初創公司來來去去，相繼開發出了不起的技術，但我們能夠趕上這波云浪潮。安迪?貝托謝姆和我有時擔心，我們進入這個市場太晚了。一個好公司的標志不僅是執行力，還包括一定的客戶接受度，而這是由運氣和時機確定的。我認為，我們能夠把所有這一切融合在一起。

????我在思科工作了15年，其實相當于105年——每1年就像是7年一樣。我是跟隨思科收購的第一家公司Crescendo進入這家公司的。那是1993年的事情，思科當時的年營收大約六、七億美元，主要從事路由器業務。首席執行官是約翰?莫格里奇，約翰?錢伯斯那時還是銷售主管。這宗收購案的確讓約翰?錢伯斯成為業界紅人。由于他們收購Crescendo花費了9,300萬美元，在接下來的那段時間里，我們就把交換機業務收入從（我也不知道具體是多少）做到了100億到150億美元。所有這一切并不僅僅是我們的功勞。我們獲得了一大筆投資。

????有一個插曲你或許會感興趣。每次思科收購一家公司時，他們首先會要求所有高管簽下兩年的合約。這個長達兩年的任職要求讓我感到極度痛苦。我說，“我怎么能夠在一家大公司待兩年時間呢？”兩年感覺就像是一輩子。我為此還痛哭過一場。就這樣，我在思科公司待滿了兩年，最終足足在那里工作了15年。但我認為，思科吸引我的一部分原因是，通過收購Crescendo，他們真的在一家大公司中培育出一種類似初創公司那樣的創業氛圍。

????思科給員工分發了許多帶有一個箭頭的T恤衫，上面寫著“通往10億之路”的字樣。他們當時的年收入大約6億美元，目標是10億美元（思科2013財年的收入為486億美元）。約翰?錢伯斯來找我，說：“我想讓你負責交換機業務，也必須做到10億哦。”

????10億？我像個小姑娘似的揉了揉眼睛：“這些家伙在說什么呢？他們就連主營業務還沒有做到10億呢。”思科收購Crescendo的時候，我們的總收入才1,000萬美元，現在他們竟然要求我做到10億的規模，簡直太荒唐了。

????現在回想起來，我當時給他的答復或許有些輕率。我說：“僅僅因為你在路由器市場做到了這一點，并不意味著你有本事能夠把交換機業務也做到這個規模。”但約翰?錢伯斯是一個極有抱負，非常樂觀的人。他說：“沒錯，我們能夠做到。”成就思科偉業的并不是Crescendo，而是投資這筆收購交易所體現出的決心，愿景和靈感。

????Jayshree Ullal made her career at networking leader Cisco Systems, before leaving in 2008 and shortly after that joining a new company started by Andy Bechtolsheim, a founder of Sun, and several others. In a recent interview, she discussed what she learned at Cisco—and how her new company, Arista Networks, competes against it. Below, her words as told to Fortune's Adam Lashinsky.

????In 2008 Arista was 30 engineers and getting ready to launch product. I left Cisco in May of 2008, and I took the summer off to evaluate clean tech and social networking, and finally came back to my roots.

????There is a lot of Cisco DNA in this company because Cisco is the biggest networking giant. People therefore assumed we were naturally going to be acquired by Cisco. The conviction with which we believed we were building an independent company wasn't understood. I think it is today. But it wasn't very clear then. Being acquired by Cisco wasn't the goal or the intent. We were really looking to build a company with legs, and there's a lot of Arista pride in building great technology, delivering a great customer experience, providing outstanding and exceptional service, and offering our customers the disrupted solution they were looking for.

????There was no doubt in our minds that we would provide technology disruption. But I think what makes us really excited is that there's a customer disruption in buying behaviors. Lots of startups come and go and build great technology, but we were able to catch the cloud wave. And there were times when Andy [Bechtolsheim] and I feared we were late to the market. The hallmark of a good company is not just execution but some set of customer acceptance which is defined by luck and timing as well. And I think we were able to get the confluence of all that.

????I was at Cisco for 15 years. The equivalent of 105 -- every year is 7 years. I came with their very first acquisition, Crescendo. This was in 1993, when the company was $600 million, $700 million in revenue, and mostly a routing company. And John Morgridge was the CEO. John Chambers was the head of sales. And this acquisition really put John [Chambers] on the map. Crescendo, because they acquired the company for $93 million, and we went on to do anywhere from, I don't know, put the numbers at $10 billion to $15 billion in switching revenue over that period of time. All of which is not just credit to us. There was a significant investment.

????A side story there you'd be interested in. First of all, when they buy a company they ask all the key chief executives to sign up for two years. I agonized over two years. I said, "How can I ever stay in a big company for two years?" Two years felt like an eternity. I wept about that process. So I lived in Cisco two years at a time for 15 years. But I think part of why Cisco became an addiction for me was they really cultivated a startup and an entrepreneurial environment through that Crescendo acquisition as part of a larger company.

????The company had T shirts at that time with an arrow that said, "path to a billion." They were 600-something million, and their goal was to hit a billion [dollars in revenue; Cisco's fiscal-year 2013 revenues were $48.6 billion]. And John Chambers came to me and said, "I want you to do switching, and that must be another billion."

????So I rolled my eyes like teenagers do and said, "What are these guys talking about? They haven't hit a billion in their mainstream market." Crescendo was all of 10 million in revenue when they bought us, and it seemed absurd to me that they would ask me to do a billion.

????And I think I even made some flip comment to him like, "Just because you did it in routers doesn't give you a right to do this in switches." So that was John Chambers -- very aspirational and very optimistic and "Yes we can do it." It wasn't Crescendo that made Cisco, it was the commitment, the vision, and the inspiration of investing in that acquisition.