Psomas Optimizes Efficiency

SAN FRANCISCO -- RiverbedTechnology, Inc. (NASDAQ: RVBD), the technology and market leader inwide-area data services (WDS), today announced that Psomas, a leadingconsulting engineering firm, has selected and successfully deployed15 Riverbed Steelhead(R) appliances, as well as Steelhead Mobilesoftware on the laptops of its mobile and remote workforce. Thedeployment has enabled Psomas to consolidate its existing ITinfrastructure in the midst of rapid company expansion and theopening of new offices -- all while facilitating greater company-widecollaboration. The speed delivered by Riverbed(R) has helped Psomas tomaintain its reputation as a nationally-ranked firm with cutting-edgetechnical expertise, while saving the company more than $1 milliondollars in a year by increasing employee productivity.

Founded in 1946 by George Psomas, Psomas is an award-winningengineering firm specializing in the land development, water andtransportation markets. Psomas provides services to the public andprivate sector in civil engineering, land surveying, land planning,entitlements, GIS, natural resources and program/constructionmanagement. Projects range from large-scale master-planneddevelopments and major highway improvements to water and wastewatertreatment plants and innovative water quality and flood controlimprovements. Today, Psomas is a full-service consulting firm of over800 employees working out of 20 offices scattered across five Westernstates and Mexico.

As a high-growth firm, Psomas has always believed in work sharing andcollaboration among its existing branch offices and newly openedlocations. Work sharing enables Psomas employees to balance workloadsand also gives them the competitive advantage of being able to matchthe right people with the right skills to the right projects --regardless of location. In order to enhance work sharing andcollaboration among its offices and reduce the strain of rolling outnew offices, Psomas needed to accelerate the performance ofapplications over its wide area network (WAN).

With its 20 percent year-over-year growth, Psomas' CIO Chris Pinckneyknew that the company needed a fast and efficient solution to reducethe strain on existing network infrastructure that would also enableimmediate productivity across new offices. "We knew we had a problem,but we didn't know there was such a great solution out there until weran across Riverbed at a conference."

After considering bandwidth upgrades and point products, Psomas choseRiverbed based on the impressive test results. Psomas regularly uses300-500 MB Auto-CAD and Bentley Microstation CAD files, and mustshare those among offices as well as remote and mobile workers.Transferring large files (such as 325MB files, which are common forPsomas) was once impractical for the company, because the filetransfer would take hours. With Riverbed, these large file transfersnow take only 14 minutes on the first pass, and edited versions ofthese large files can now be downloaded by remote staff in a matterof seconds -- the same amount of time that it takes Psomas' employeesto access the file on a local area network (LAN).Psomas was also faced with the challenge of adapting to a newbusiness environment that requires more flexibility in order to meetthe needs of an increasingly distributed and mobile workforce. "Thereare a number of factors at play," said Pinckney. "First, we havemany employees that frequently work from client or job sites thatneed to maintain access to large files while on the road. And just aswe need to enable people to work from remote locations, we must alsobe flexible enough to enable employees to effectively work from homewhenever needed. There is a lot of competition for talent in today'smarket, and in order to get and retain the best people, we need toprovide employees the ability to work wherever they are."

"Steelhead Mobile is a powerful tool for us," Pinckney said."Combined with 3G cards, workers can access, download and collaborateon large files -- such as CAD or PowerPoint files -- within just aminute or two, no matter where they are in the world. We would havenever even thought of being able to download these large files over a3G card before Steelhead Mobile. And more importantly, remote andmobile employees are no longer difficult to collaborate with -- theycan operate with the rest of their team just as if they were in thenext cubicle. We even have a remote employee who said that, withRiverbed, he feels like he is truly 'part of the team' for the firsttime."

Riverbed Technology Inc.