Month: January 2025

Originally published on GoDaddy Resource Library

At GoDaddy, we’re all about supporting the dreamers, the doers, and the builders who make the internet an exciting, inclusive place. Whether it’s entrepreneurs launching their first business or open source developers shaping the tools powering the open web, we believe in empowering people to thrive online.

But what does that look like in practice? It means putting our money, our talent, and our resources behind the open-source projects that make the internet work—and supporting the people who make it all possible.

Let’s talk about how GoDaddy is showing up for the open web, open source, and the “Everyday Contributors” who bring it to life.

Our Commitment to Open Source

From day one, GoDaddy has been a proud supporter of open source. One of our biggest contributions? We’re founding members of the OpenJS Foundation, which emerged in 2019 when the Node.js Foundation and the JS Foundation joined forces (Wikipedia).

We’ve stayed active ever since. GoDaddy participates in the OpenJS World track of events like the Open Source Summit North America as attendees and contributors, advocating for the tools and technologies that underpin the modern web. (GoDaddy News).

For us, it’s about more than just showing up—it’s about making a real difference. That’s why we invest in programs and partnerships that strengthen open-source communities, drive innovation, and promote collaboration.

Making a Difference in WordPress

If you’ve spent any time online, there’s a good chance you’ve interacted with WordPress—it powers over 40% of the internet! At GoDaddy, we’re not just fans of WordPress; we’re active contributors.

Here’s what we’re doing to support WordPress:

Full-Time Contributors: We employ two full-time developers, Kira Schroder and George Mamadashvilili, who work exclusively on WordPress core development. They’re the superheroes behind the scenes, ensuring WordPress stays fast, secure, and scalable.Contractor Support: In addition to our in-house team, we work with contractors, such as Joe Dolson, who bring fresh ideas and expertise to enhance WordPress’s features and ecosystem.Staff Support: GoDaddy proudly sponsors 46 contributors, dedicating 255 hours per week to WordPress across 17 teams

By supporting WordPress at every level, we’re helping to build a stronger, more sustainable open web.

Everyday Entrepreneurs and Contributors: The People Who Power the Web

At GoDaddy, we talk a lot about Everyday Entrepreneurs—the small business owners, creators, and freelancers turning their ideas into reality online. We give them the tools and resources they need to succeed, from domain names to website builders (About GoDaddy).

But there’s another group we’re equally passionate about: Everyday Contributors.

They’re the reason technology like WordPress, and PHP, and JavaScript exist—and we’re proud to support them with funding, mentorship, and opportunities to shine. The coders, designers, project managers, and documenters who work tirelessly to create and maintain open-source tools are the backbone of the open web, and we’re committed to helping them thrive.

How GoDaddy Shows Up for Open Source

Here’s a snapshot of how we’re investing in open source and the open web:

PHP Coding Standards (PHPCS): GoDaddy gave $12,000 to support PHP code quality tools.PHP Foundation: GoDaddy donated $24,000 to help sustain PHP, the language powering nearly 80% of the the web.World Wide Web Consortium (W3C): GoDaddy donated $40,000 to champion open web standards through the W3C, the organization which brings together global stakeholders to develop open standards which enable a web that connects and empowers humanity.WP Accessibility Meetup: GoDaddy sponsors live captions for the group annually, ensuring that events are accessible to a broader audience, including those who are deaf or hard of hearing, and promoting inclusivity within the WordPress community.The WP Community Collective: We’ve pledged $520,000 to this initiative focused on funding and empowering WordPress and open source contributors. This partnership will be directed towards providing financial, operational and promotional support within the greater WP community. It’s all about giving back to the community that keeps WordPress thriving.

These contributions go beyond dollars and cents. They’re a testament to our belief in a free and open internet where everyone can contribute, collaborate, and succeed.

What’s Next for GoDaddy and the Open Web?

Our vision for the future is simple: keep investing in the tools, people, and communities that make the web work. Whether it’s funding new initiatives, supporting Everyday Contributors, or empowering entrepreneurs, we’re committed to building a better, more inclusive internet for all.

And you can be part of this journey! Whether you’re a developer, a designer, or an entrepreneur, your contributions matter. Check out the open-source projects we’re supporting, or dive into the WordPress community. Together, we can make the open web stronger than ever.

Let’s build the internet we all deserve—open, collaborative, and full of opportunity.

Veolia North America Sustainability Report 2024

Veolia North America’s engineered fuels program evaluates non-hazardous industrial byproducts like plastics, packaging scraps, debris and more, then shreds and decontaminates the materials to use them as an alternative fuel in cement kilns. This is a 100% closed-loop circular economy solution, as the ash is integrated into the product and not sent to a landfill.

Waste Converted to Energy for Cement Production: 

240,000 pounds of waste recovered annually Used in the production of cement 1,000 tons of cement produced 

Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions: 

GHG emitted from 1 ton of typical fuel*: Landfilled: 1.85 metric ton CO₂eq. Used as engineered fuel: .59 metric ton CO₂eq. Savings: 1.26 metric tons

*Based on a typical fuel profile and EPA or IPCC emission factors. 

Engineered fuels also help kilns avoid emissions of 1.06 metric tons per ton of engineered fuel combusted.

Continue reading the full report

Albertsons Companies has been honored with two 2024 Impact Awards from Progressive Grocer. This recognition highlights our commitment to our Recipe for Change and supporting the planet we share and the communities we serve.

One of the awards celebrates Albertsons Cos.’ Own Brands team’s efforts in Philanthropic Innovation and Corporate Giving. The grocer’s July 2023 O Organics® Fight Hunger, Serve Hope campaign made a significant impact in combatting hunger during the summer months, when food insecurity rates are higher among households with school-age children. During this campaign, one meal was donated for each O Organics product purchased, which enabled the donation of $7 million, the equivalent of 28 million meals, through the Albertsons Companies Foundation’s Nourishing Neighbors Program.

Albertsons Companies incredibly proud of the efforts of our team and the generosity of our customers who make this possible. Together, we are making a difference and driving positive change. Thank you to Progressive Grocer for this esteemed honor and to everyone who supports our mission.

See original post on LinkedIn and read more about Albertsons Companies and our Recipe for Change on our website.

Orginally published on Illumina News Center

Over the last 20 years, precision medicine has become the standard of care, but for many hospitals, the complexity of the process has made it challenging to integrate or manage efficiently and at scale. To be successful, health care organizations need to think about how to educate physicians and staff system-wide, how to manage large datasets, and how to deliver results in a consistent way. The clinical workflow must make sense for patients, physicians, and hospitals.

Children’s Hospital Colorado (Children’s Colorado) was once in that position, balancing resources and refining processes in order to fully integrate precision medicine.

“We wanted to approach it from a holistic point of view and not that one specialty would be precision medicine and everything else would be just medicine,” says Alisa Gaskell, PhD, scientific director of the Precision Medicine Institute at Children’s Colorado. “We stood up three pillars—diagnostics, therapeutics, and education—to create a cohesive, institutional-level vision.”

Integrating genomic diagnostics into day-to-day care 
Children’s Colorado formally took on the challenge in July 2023, when it established the Precision Medicine Institute, cofounded by Gaskell; Scott Demarest, MD, medical director; and Gregor Stoddard, administrative director. The institute delivers whole-genome sequencing data to clinical settings, conducts research, and generally leverages genomics to improve care.

“We create systems that help clinical groups maximize their ability to implement genomic testing,” Demarest says. “We want them to feel confident they are delivering accurate diagnoses, based on the testing, and can confidently act on those diagnoses.”

The precision medicine team realized early on that the hospital’s electronic health record (EHR) system would be the best conduit to ensure that genetic information is easily accessed, clinically relevant, and fully responsive to the most current genomic research.

The first step in institutionalizing genomics is to ensure that the results are stored as discrete entries within the EHR. At Children’s Colorado, the clinical genomics laboratory accomplished this in 2020. Having made genomic results searchable, the precision medicine team was well positioned to bring that data closer to clinical practice. Now, if a provider is making decisions that could benefit from genomic data, the system scans for relevant results. If it finds them, it shares those insights. If not, it recommends a genomic test.

“Integrating that information in a more sophisticated way has been key to ensuring patients and physicians have the right information at the right time to make the right decisions,” Demarest says.

One early success has been in pharmacogenomics, which measures how genetics influence a patient’s responses to specific drugs. Timely information can help physicians make the most appropriate choices.

“It prompts them, saying their drug or dosing choice may be influenced by a pharmacogenomic result, and here are the guidelines to make that adjustment,” Demarest says. “We’re building it into the workflow to make it as easy as possible for physicians to implement.”

Genomic knowledge is constantly growing, and the system is designed to keep up. In the case of pharmacogenomics, new research may show that a certain gene variation makes a medication dangerous for some people. A patient’s sequencing data may be two years old, but the EHR now synthesizes the existing data with the new research. If a physician tries to order that medication, the prescription will be flagged.

“If we build something that’s only attuned to today’s level of knowledge, it’s going to age very quickly,” Gaskell says. “If a provider is choosing a blood medication, today there may be four different drugs and two genotypes that influence the decision. A year from now, there may be six drugs and 10 genotypes. Because we’re capturing whole-genome data that’s dynamically linked to our EHR, we can make real-time adjustments by just pushing a button.”

This dynamic connectivity between the EHR and large genomic data extends beyond pharmacogenomics. Considering that their hospital is dedicated entirely to children, the precision medicine team has a grand vision of delivering usable and dynamic information across the system of care.

“While pharmacogenomics is a great example of how genomics can impact a health care system, the same approach can deliver life-changing information in the rare disease and cancer spaces, leveraging system builds to support access to testing and actionability,” Gaskell says.

The feedback loop 
One of the Precision Medicine Institute’s most important missions is education—increasing each provider’s genomic intelligence quotient.

To keep that knowledge flowing, the Precision Medicine Institute has created a clinical liaison committee, which includes 20 clinical areas and meets monthly to discuss the best ways to implement precision medicine.

“When we’re developing pharmacogenomics and other programs, it helps us understand whether we’re getting the details right,” Demarest says. “That helps us get the big picture to make sure we’re delivering programs that benefit providers and improve care.”

Illumina’s role from the start 
Illumina has been partnering with the Children’s Colorado genomics team for around seven years, long before the Precision Medicine Institute was established.

“Illumina and our teams have been committed to seeing our hospital take on clinical genomics,” Gaskell says. “We’ve leveraged our team’s know-how with Illumina’s products to get to that excellent clinical implementation.”

The Precision Medicine Institute has integrated a suite of Illumina products to manage their data pipeline. Clarity LIMS tracks samples and helps manage the genomics workflows. Illumina Connected Analytics helps analyze and query large datasets. DRAGEN provides data analysis, and Emedgene automates interpretation and research.

In turn, the Children’s Colorado team developed a custom application programming interface to coordinate the hardware and software. The Precision Medicine Institute has three Illumina sequencers—two NovaSeq 6000 Systems and one NovaSeq X Plus System—and the data pipeline has been fully integrated. This is particularly useful in complex cases, such as rare diseases, in which patients and their parents are all sequenced.

This has been a collaborative project from the start. Illumina shared the applications’ underlying code so Children’s Colorado could knit them together and scale them for its incredibly high volume—around 450 datasets a month.

“We developed an operational dashboard to integrate all the data,” Gaskell says. “That means I can see where a sample is with just one click. If there’s a question about family samples, it takes me less than a minute to answer it. That’s really the goal: take complex data and make it easy to understand and actionable. Putting everything together, we give our researchers and clinicians better tools to succeed.”

SEATTLE, January 28, 2025 /3BL/ – Climate Vault, an award-winning leader in sustainable technology, today announced the recipients of the second annual Carbon Champion Awards. The award program honors organizations that are setting the standards for positive climate action through bold, strategic, and scientifically credible approaches to managing their carbon footprint. The 2024 Carbon Champions exemplify leadership in driving impactful climate initiatives within their organizations and across industries.

The 2024 Carbon Champion Award recipients are:

1. Unity: Overall Carbon Champion Award

The Overall Carbon Champion Award honors an organization that leads the way in comprehensive climate action across its operations and industry. Unity, the leading platform to create and grow games and interactive experiences, has set an ambitious climate target aligned with Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi)—encompassing its Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions. It also uses its ecosystem to inspire sustainable practices in the gaming and tech sectors. From optimized software practices to efforts to empower Unity creators that support sustainability, Unity’s dedication to climate action serves as a powerful example for others in the technology industry.

2. DRW: Carbon Champion Innovator Award

The Innovator Award is given to organizations that approach climate action with creativity and forward-thinking solutions. DRW, a diversified trading firm innovating across both traditional and cutting-edge markets, has taken a unique approach to carbon finance. With the 2024 launch of Artemeter to support a sustainable tomorrow with innovative carbon financing and investment —it created a critical tool for advancing impactful carbon reduction efforts. As the first carbon-neutral global trading firm, DRW stands out for its commitment to developing non-traditional carbon reduction strategies that advance sustainability across the financial sector.

3. Tripadvisor: Carbon Champion Catalyst Award

The Catalyst Award celebrates organizations that inspire and mobilize others to engage in meaningful climate action. Tripadvisor, one of the world’s largest travel guidance platforms, has led the way in sustainable travel this year by increasing guidance around responsible travel, while collaborating with valued partners to measure, reduce, and neutralise carbon emissions from across a program of global branded partnerships & experiential events. Tripadvisor has an important role to play in providing travelers with the information and resources to make travel decisions that protect the environment, support local communities and safeguard the welfare of wildlife.

4. C.H. Guenther & Son: Carbon Champion Game Changer Award

The Game Changer Award honors organizations that achieve transformative results in emissions reduction. C.H. Guenther & Son, a global food manufacturer, has prioritized sustainable practices across its operations—implementing energy efficiency improvements, waste reduction initiatives, and sustainable sourcing practices. These measurable steps have had a tangible impact on reducing the company’s environmental footprint, setting a high bar for sustainability in the food production industry.

5. Kearney: Carbon Champion Amplifier Award

The Amplifier Award recognizes organizations that leverage their platforms to advance public awareness and thought leadership on climate action. Kearney, a leading global management consulting firm, has been an active voice in global sustainability by participating in high-profile climate events and collaborating with local and international partners. Through its thought leadership and engagement, Kearney has amplified the climate conversation and championed sustainable practices across multiple sectors.

“This year’s Carbon Champion recipients exemplify the highest standards of dedication, innovation, and collaboration in tackling climate change,” said Jon Cohen, CEO of Climate Vault Solutions. “Their achievements underscore the power of markets-based, verifiable climate solutions that are impactful, measurable and brand-enhancing. Climate Vault is proud to support them in these efforts.”

The 2024 Carbon Champion Awards celebrate outstanding achievements in sustainability, innovation, and partnership. Each award category represents a unique aspect of climate leadership, from groundbreaking solutions to strategic advocacy and collaboration. Recipients represent a cross section of industries that are using Climate Vault to reduce and remove their carbon emissions in a way that makes a verifiable impact on the planet.

Visit Climate Vault online to learn more about how its comprehensive suite of carbon management products support organizations in measuring, reducing, and ultimately removing their carbon footprints in order to contribute to impactful climate action.

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About Climate Vault Solutions 
Climate Vault Solutions is a leading provider of sustainability solutions, helping organizations measure, manage, and reduce their carbon footprint in the most impactful and credible way possible. Its integrated reduction and removal program leverages government-regulated compliance carbon markets to knock out carbon in days, not decades. This approach generates the environmental impact that today’s employees, stakeholders and customers care about and expect from organizations. With a focus on transparency and verifiability, Climate Vault enables companies to take meaningful climate action today, while driving tangible progress towards a net-zero future. Learn more at www.climatevault.com.