Blue Coat Systems, Inc, the leader in WAN Application Delivery and Secure Web Gateway, held its largest Channel Partner Conference in the Middle East at Emirates Palace Hotel in Abu Dhabi.

Resellers from 14 countries in addition to key distributor and systems integrator partners from throughout the Middle East attended the meeting, which featured presentations from senior Blue Coat executives on market trends, operation updates and overall sales in the Middle East. It also featured the most up-to-date information on the company’s latest WAN optimization and Web security products, said an official spokesman.

“This conference was an outstanding opportunity to bring together key partners from throughout the Middle East region to discuss WAN Application Delivery, our evolving approach to WAN optimisation, and to provide them with the tools, resources and information they need expand their business in the region and be more successful,” said Blue Coat Systems Middle East regional director Nidal Taha.

The performance of remote applications across the WAN is becoming more critical to businesses around the globe as companies and organizations have more employees working remotely or in branch offices.

Employee productivity and company operations depend on data transmission between branch offices and headquarters; therefore, any delays can affect time-sensitive decisions and impact bottom line profitability.

IT managers, who are faced with the challenge of cutting costs while still improving performance, are turning to WAN optimization tools which are designed to increase effective throughput and decrease network lag time.

“Businesses are starting to invest in WAN optimization to accelerate centralized applications and reduce branch office bandwidth costs, improve or maintain application availability and simplify IT infrastructure globally,” added Taha.

“Businesses can benefit from Blue Coat WAN Application Delivery by providing their employees and partners with real-time access to important applications and services, which in turn increases employee productivity and customer loyalty.”

Blue Coat has been ranked first in worldwide market share for WAN Application Delivery in the first half of 2007 by IDC, a leading market research and advisory firm. Currently, Blue Coat has over 700 WAN optimisation customers around the world, including more than a dozen with implementations exceeding 100 sites. In total, Blue Coat has over 6,000 customers and 40,000 appliances shipped. – TradeArabia News Service