SAN FRANCISCO, May 12 (Xinhua) -- Cisco Systems Inc. on Wednesday reported that its profit in the most recent quarter surged nearly 63 percent from the previous year, which was seen as a reflection of the continuing recovery of global economy.

In the three months ended on May 1, Cisco's net income rose to 2.2 billion U.S. dollars, compared with 1.3 billion dollars in the same period a year earlier.

The world's largest networking equipment maker posted a revenue of 10.4 billion dollars in the company's 2010 fiscal third quarter, representing an increase of 27 percent year-on-year.

Excluding costs and other items, earnings per share were 42 cents, which together with the revenue number topped analysts' estimates.

"We witnessed a return to strong balanced growth across geographies, products and customer segments that we haven't seen since before the global economic challenges began," John Chambers, Cisco's chief executive officer, said in a statement.

"It is clear that our game plan for how to handle economic downturns is hitting on all cylinders," he added, calling the past quarter "probably the strongest" one in the company's history.