Citrix goes 'virtually' innovative

LAS VEGAS, USA: Virtualization took the center stage at the Citrix Synergy 2009 event that started here on Tuesday. With its Xen suite of solutions cutting across desktop, application and client, Citrix has emerged as a key player in the virtualization and the cloud market. This was the message that Citrix executives drove home on the opening day of the company’s annual mega event - Synergy 2009.

Delivering the opening day key note, Citrix president and CEO Mark Templeton said, “Technology is here to support the business and deliver significant value. Innovation and simplicity will be the key drivers. The intersection between the PCs and the mainframes was a disruptive development. Similarly what we are seeing is a crossover of Web 2.0, consumer and the enterprises.”

Over the years Citrix through strategic acquisitions and through its own development has created a strong portfolio of products that revolves around Delivery Center, Online Services and Citrix Cloud Center (C3). The company is one among the top five cloud service providers and Xen App is one of the leading virtualization solutions in the world with hundreds of deployments.

In line with its innovation and simplicity theme the company launched two very innovative solutions at the event that will have big impact on end users - Dazzle and Citrix iPhone Receiver.

Dazzle is the first self-service storefront for enterprise applications. Dazzle gives corporate employees 24x7 self-service access to a broad array of applications, desktops and content, allowing them to choose exactly what they need, when they need it.

For more than 200,000 enterprise customers already using Citrix Delivery Center products like Xen App and Xen Desktop, Dazzle acts as a storefront to their existing delivery infrastructure. It offers a rich, intuitive user experience that requires no training. The Dazzle as a concept is similar to DirecTV or Apple iTunes. The user just picks and use the apps needed from the store for a period of time.

“Every day, employees are presented with an amazing array of exciting apps and services on the web that spark their imagination and put them in full control of their experience. Then they come to work, and their IT experience is mandated by a bland ‘general issue’ sameness that threatens to drive every ounce of productivity and innovation out of them,” said Mark Templeton while commenting on the new solution.

“Now, for the first time ever, we are giving IT departments a tool that helps them truly dazzle end users with an ultra cool, self-service storefront, empowering employees to select the apps, desktops and services they need, whenever they need them. The hidden reality, of course, is that by giving employees the choice they so desperately want, IT actually saves a ton of money and gains even more control over the things that really matter.”

On the other hand, the iPhone Citrix receiver is a mobile application. It gives the iPod and iPhone users to access their Windows apps from anywhere. Through this receiver the users can gain access to corporate data on the go. According to the company this receiver will make for creating an agile mobile workforce. Citrix is going aggressive on its Xen suite of products and it has already emerged as a major solution in the virtualization space.

With other innovative solutions like Dazzle the company is creating a highly flexible on-demand service-oriented IT delivery environment that is just right for the requirements.