Today, Cisco products are available in more than 52 towns and cities of India. We have over 1200 retailers and a galaxy of top-notch system integrators providing solutions to the market place like IBM, Compaq, Wipro data craft, and HCL, amongst others. Therefore I am confident that the demand for Cisco products will continue to remain robust. I think you should focus your energies in becoming a CCIE - our partners always keep asking me for more CCIE, considering the complexity of networks they are integrating today. Cisco networking professionals find employment based on the kind of certification they get.
Cisco offers specialisation in many areas.
For example, if you become an IP telephony expert and have a CIPT certification you would find tremendous interest from multinationals that are deploying networks based on the avid architecture. I would not be able to comment on this till I understand the meaning of bad. Yes there is a downturn, yes cap-ex spending is down. My answer is no. Any guy who is unhappy out there should get his mind focussed on achieving what he or she has set out for.