On December 9, 2011, Sunnyvale, California-based Blue Coat Systems (NASDAQ: BCSI) announced that it had entered into an agreement to be acquired by private equity firm Thoma Bravo in a cash transaction of $25.81 per share, or approximately $1.3 billion in total. Recent Thoma Bravo investments have been characterized in part by technologies that make the most of common intersections of IT optimization and security. Blue Coat fits this profile well. By having achieved a position at the center of network application optimization, security, and technology offered as a service, Blue Coat should deliver positive results for Thoma Bravo investors, with significant promise going forward given the role that WAN optimization may well play for organizations seeking to secure and optimize their investments in the Cloud.