Back in August, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission ordered public companies to make most proxy materials available online and notify investors they could access those documents at corporate websites. For Sun Microsystems, the rule has been a boon for the environment and the bottom line. More than 90 percent of Sun’s (JAVA) investors preferred to view the docs online, according to the Silicon Valley computer and software company. That meant Sun was able to slash the number of printed copies of proxy materials for its 2007 annual shareholders meeting from 800,000 to 75,000. Printing nearly 100 million fewer pages translates to saving 11,964 carbon-absorbing trees, according to the Environmental Defense Paper Calculator.
Sun Investors Go Paperless
October 22, 2007 by Todd Woody
Green Wombat 
The rule was effective July 1, 2007. We were one of the first companies to utilize the notice and access method. It worked very well for us.
Dan Weirich
CFO
8×8, Inc.
8×8, Inc. Announces Internet Availability of 2007 Proxy Materials Per New SEC ‘Notice and Access’ Model
SANTA CLARA, Calif., July 24 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — 8×8, Inc. (NASDAQ: EGHT), provider of Packet8 (http://www.packet8.net/) residential, business and video Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) phone services, today announced the online availability of its 2007 Proxy Statement in accordance with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) December 13, 2006 decision allowing companies to furnish proxy materials to shareholders through a “Notice and Access” model using the Internet.
The “Notice and Access Rule” removes the requirement for public companies to automatically send shareholders a full, hard-copy set of annual meeting and proxy materials and allows them to instead to deliver to their shareholders a “Notice of Internet Availability of Proxy Materials” and to provide online access to the documents. 8×8 mailed a “Notice of Internet Availability of Proxy Materials” on July 18, 2007 to all beneficial owners entitled to vote at the 2007 Annual Shareholder Meeting to be held on August 28, 2007 at the Company’s corporate headquarters in Santa Clara, California.
“8×8 is pleased to be one of the first publicly traded companies to take advantage of this new SEC initiative,” said 8×8 CFO Dan Weirich. “In addition to substantially decreasing the printing and postage costs previously incurred by producing and mailing these hard copy materials, this amendment benefits the environment by helping to preserve the nation’s forests and reducing the fuel consumed in transporting the proxy materials to the post office and delivering them to shareholders. Our decision to utilize the “Notice and Access” method of delivery saved approximately 38 trees. We applaud the SEC’s vision to leverage the Internet to more efficiently deliver proxy materials to investors.”
According to American Forests (americanforests.org), the nation’s oldest nonprofit citizens’ conservation organization, for the 300 million or so packages each year that are currently mailed, the “Notice and Access” model could save 800,000 trees from being cut to produce the paper involved in the mailings, trees which would remove some 267,000 tons of greenhouse gas from the atmosphere annually if left to grow. Over just 5 years, this initiative would save more than 4 million trees from being cut.
8×8’s 2007 Proxy Statement, Annual Report and other financial documents are available free of charge at the Securities and Exchange Commission website, http://www.sec.gov/, and at the Investor Relations section of its corporate website, http://www.8×8.com/.
About 8×8, Inc.
VoIP service provider 8×8, Inc. offers internet-based telephony solutions (http://www.packet8.net/) for individual residential and business users as well as small to medium sized business organizations. In addition to regular Packet8 VoIP service plans priced as low as $24.99 per month for unlimited anytime calling to the U.S. and Canada, 8×8 offers the Packet8 Tango Video Terminal Adapter and DV 326 VideoPhone along with accompanying monthly service plans also priced at $24.99 per month. Packet8 Virtual Office, 8×8’s VoIP phone system for small to medium sized businesses, is a hosted PBX solution comprised of powerful business class features. Companies subscribing to Virtual Office pay just $49.99 per month per extension for enterprise class PBX functionality along with unlimited local and long distance calling in the U.S. and Canada. Packet8 Softalk Office™, 8×8’s PC-based soft phone client, offers high quality voice and video in-network calling as well as outbound calling to the PSTN. For additional company information, visit 8×8’s web site at http://www.8×8.com/.
NOTE: 8×8, the 8×8 logo, Packet8, the Packet8 logo, Packet8 Virtual Office, Packet8 Softalk and Packet8 Tango are trademarks of 8×8, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
SOURCE: 8×8, Inc.
CONTACT: Joan Citelli of 8×8, Inc., jcitelli@8×8.com, +1-408-687-4320
Web site: http://www.8×8.com/
Wow…I was just looking for info on this today and here you are posting on the same day!
Another benefit of Notice and Access is that once a shareholder registers their preference to receive electronic copies they don’t have to be mailed even the notice the following year. While individuals have the choice for most companies to select e-delivery, this, in a way, forces them to choose in order to vote.
As a clarification – companies can still mail out the whole package of information if they choose (they just have to include a paragraph that it is also available on the web). Thank you SUN and 8×8 for not mailing it out! Now take all that money you saved and invest it in some green tech:)
Do you know of a list of companies that chose to participate fully (aka not automatically mail the full proxy and annual report and only mail the notice)? A lot of companies are still going to mail the full report because they are afraid people won’t vote if they don’t, and they want to send the pretty annual report. It would be good to lean on them to not do this.
Oh, I forgot to mention though that the SEC has proposed these rules become mandatory (aka a company can’t mail everyone annual report materials automatically) over the next two years. Hopefully, they will follow through with this!
I knew Sun was losing money, but they can’t even afford to print the Proxy Statements anymore? 🙂 This reminds me of the press releases where they say they declare dominance of the non-Linux Unix market (being, effectively, the only player in that field anymore).