Technology industry icon Cisco Systems (CSCO) made a major acquisition in September. It agreed to buy Splunk (SPLK) for $28bn in cash. The big question is: Is this deal “transformational” for Cisco stock?

The Splunk acquisition is expected to be completed in 9-12 months. Splunk, which is based on data analytics software, has expanded its business to cybersecurity. The company is also shifting to a software-as-a-service business model and moving away from on-premise products.

Cisco is looking to increase recurring revenue from software and subscription services and move away from its core business of selling network switches and routers.