The NVIDIA Blog

It’s Not Easy Being Green: Making Progress in Sustainability

Posted: 10 Jun 2015 09:00 AM PDT

Gamers call us "Team Green." They don't do it because of our commitment to social and environmental responsibility. Maybe they should.

Every day our 9,000-plus employees in 24 countries work to improve the energy efficiency of our products and boost the sustainability of our operations. Going green takes real grunt.

All that work is worth it. This week we published our latest progress report: our sixth annual Corporate Responsibility Report. Among the highlights:

NVIDIA corporate responsibility report infographic — Click to view a full-size infographic on our progress in sustainability.

We're now in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index, the highest-profile ranking of its kind.
We scored 92 out of 100 on the Carbon Disclosure Project, which looks at the risks created by climate change. We've risen steadily in this area since scoring 34 five years ago.
At No. 20, we rank in the top 4 percent of U.S. companies in the latest Newsweek Green Rankings. It's our sixth year in a row on the list.

But we've got more work to do.

We're improving our operational efficiency. We engineer our products to maximize performance and minimize energy use. We audit key suppliers and conduct internal assessments to ensure that we address all aspects of responsible supply chain management.

We also prize employee recruitment and retention. We take pride in our culture of collaboration and diversity, while celebrating individual drive. Our employees agree. Their feedback in the 2015 Glassdoor Employees' Choice Award put us on the site's "best place to work" list.

We also manage our risk and reputation. We work with our global suppliers to ensure they're committed to social and environmental responsibility, too.

We're invested in long-term efforts to improve the planet:

Our work in deep learning will revolutionize how humans benefit from technology, helping make cars safer and medical treatments more effective.
The NVIDIA Global Impact Award grants $150,000 to researchers using our technology to solve some of the world's toughest problems.
We're committed to increasing the diversity of our workforce and investing to make engineering careers more attractive to young women and men from all walks of life.
We plan to cut our greenhouse gas footprint by 15 percent per employee by 2020.

Our innovations drive the market forward. With that come social and environmental considerations. We recognize this as a responsibility, and we're committed to running our own business sustainably.

Read more about all our efforts in our Corporate Responsibility Report.

The post It's Not Easy Being Green: Making Progress in Sustainability appeared first on The Official NVIDIA Blog.

Code Play: Kids Learn App-Building, Game-Design Skills at CodeDay

Posted: 09 Jun 2015 01:31 PM PDT

With almost 4 million apps available for download, a few more may soon hit the pile after a group of teens attended CodeDay at our Santa Clara campus one recent weekend.

NVIDIA mentors advise students at CodeDay.

About 130 students, armed with their own PCs and sleeping bags, came for a 24-hour app- and game-building frenzy. The event was sponsored by StudentRND, a nonprofit that gets students from middle school through college excited about tech.

CodeDay helps students learn to work in teams to build an app or game, and gives them an early taste of an all-nighter. Students from across the Bay Area, many possessing basic programming experience, arrived for a noon kickoff.

Kids from at least five NVIDIA families joined the fun. And about 17 NVIDIANs volunteered as programming advisors and mentors.

There were hands-on tutorials with examples of how to tackle problems as they arose. Instructors also offered workshops on game design, web development and Git, an open-source version control system.

The learning curve was steep as boys and girls from across the Bay Area collaborated with other students, some of whom they just met.

Unlike a hackathon, rules for CodeDay are relaxed, with projects allowed in any programming framework or language.

Students created many surprising apps.

One team worked on a way to summarize text after taking a picture of information. Another created a way to choose movies based on previously liked films. Other students worked on a way to control a computer from any device.

There was some down time, too. Fueled by more than 90 pizzas, and with donuts as a midnight snack, students competed in a "Super Smash Bros." tournament from 1:30 a.m. to 3 a.m. and then played "Super Mario" until 4 a.m.

Judges assessed presentations the following day. The goal wasn't about prizes. Learning new skills as part of a team was the event's real focus.

The post Code Play: Kids Learn App-Building, Game-Design Skills at CodeDay appeared first on The Official NVIDIA Blog.