Blue Coat Opens New Environmentally-Friendly Corporate Headquarters

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Blue Coat “Blue Planet” corporate social responsibility initiative reduces impact on environment, educates employees and cuts costs

  Blue Coat Systems, WAN optimization and Secure Web Gateway company announced that it has occupied its new corporate headquarters that are designed to minimize its environmental impact through reduction in electricity and water consumption, increased recycling and reduction of waste. The new facility is an integral element of the company’s “Blue Planet” initiative intended to reduce the company’s environmental impact, save operational costs and educate employees to decrease their own carbon-footprints.   The new Sunnyvale, Calif. building houses corporate employees, including many from the Blue Coat acquisition of Packeteer, Inc. seven months ago. It is located adjacent to an existing Blue Coat office. Environmentally-friendly features include:   -     Energy-efficient T5 fluorescent lighting for a 60 percent savings in energy consumption with 30 percent brighter light -     The use of soda fountains and multi-stage drinking water fil

tration systems in place of traditional beverages in cans and bottles -     Waterless fixtures in men’s restrooms, saving up to 240,000 gallons of water annually -     Use of glass walls to increase radiance of natural sunlight -     Motion detectors and timing systems for efficient lighting, heating and air conditioning   “Blue Coat is committed to being a good steward of the environment in all aspects of business through the lessening of our carbon footprint and reduction of resources we consume,” said Brian NeSmith, president and chief executive officer, Blue Coat Systems. “Blue Planet is our corporate initiative for a greener company, and is intended to help our employees, partners and even customers become more environmentally responsible. It’s the right thing to do for our planet and it provides us considerable operational savings in the process.”   Besides the new environmentally-friendly headquarters, Blue Planet pr

ograms encompass: -     Significant changes to its IT systems to reduce power consumption from servers and other resources -     Design for environment engineering and development efforts to create more energy-efficient products that are recyclable and environmentally-friendly; Blue Coat products are already RoHS compliant and meet the other environmental requirements of international jurisdictions -     Travel-reduction programs coupled with new video conferencing systems and other virtual meeting enablers -     Employee education, contests and best practices collaboration -     Worldwide product fulfillment streamlining for carbon reduction and cost reduction -     Use of Blue Coat’s own ProxyClient software to enable employees to work safely and efficiently from home or remote locations   Blue Coat expects its Blue Planet initiative to reduce operational costs by at least $4 millio

n and at least 4,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the next 12-18 months.