Virtualization.com

Citrix Improves Economics of Desktop Virtualization to Drive Mainstream Adoption

————————————————————————————————————-

————————————————————————————————————-

Citrix Systems today announced improvements in scalability across multiple virtual desktop delivery models to address the needs of every user in the enterprise at a lower cost.

Citrix XenDesktop 4 with FlexCast delivery technology has now been verified to deliver up to 125 VDI-based desktops, 500 hosted shared desktops and 5,000 local streamed desktops from a single physical server tuned to take advantage of the unique innovations of the latest Intel Xeon processor 5500 technology.

These numbers represent orders of magnitude higher scalability than first generation VDI-only products, enabling IT organizations to deploy desktop virtualization solutions enterprise wide with less datacenter infrastructure and significantly lower operating costs. The new scalability data and testing methodology is available today in a new desktop virtualization reference architecture.

The latest Citrix scalability tests were carefully designed to use a mainstream server configuration. Desktop workload simulations incorporated a real-world mix of line-of-business apps, office productivity apps, web browsing and multimedia. The results demonstrate that XenDesktop 4 with FlexCast can deliver up to 40 times more users (5,000 per physical server) than competing solutions which only support VDI-based desktops and max out at just over 100 users per physical server. This makes XenDesktop the only solution on the market that can truly deliver enterprise-wide virtual desktop deployments in a cost-effective way. With XenDesktop 4, desktop virtualization can now be implemented with 20 percent lower infrastructure costs.

Citrix also made available today a reference architecture for large-scale deployments that can help guide organizations who are looking at rolling out virtual desktops to a broad set of users. The new XenDesktop reference architecture is based on numerous real-world large-scale XenDesktop implementations, and provides a baseline model for a modular approach to designing and scaling to meet the needs of an entire enterprise. It provides a starting point and a solid understanding of the components and capabilities of each FlexCast delivery model, enabling customers to assemble a desktop virtualization architecture that’s tailored to each environment’s unique needs.

The XenDesktop reference architecture and set of guidelines will be maintained online so that customers can access the latest data.

Wind River to Add Virtutech Simics Products to its Own Solutions

————————————————————————————————————-

————————————————————————————————————-

Wind River, a wholly owned subsidiary of Intel, today announced it will add the Virtutech product line to its embedded software product portfolio after the completion of Intel’s acquisition of Virtutech signed earlier this week. Virtutech, founded in 1998, is based in San Jose, Calif. and operates a development center in Stockholm, Sweden.

Wind River will sell and support Virtutech’s flagship development platform, Simics, as a stand-alone product and will continue to support all current architectures including ARM, Intel, MIPS and PowerPC. Simics will allow Wind River to offer a market-leading virtual systems development solution in a growing market segment of virtualization and simulation tools for device software development.

Simics provides binary-compatible hardware simulations that operate completely within a virtualized environment running on standard laptop or desktop PCs. This strategy allows OEMs to undertake critical software development activities on a virtual platform, independently of any hardware development schedules, semiconductor availability constraints or other limitations. This also allows semiconductor manufacturers to redefine complex system-on-chip development with greater ecosystem support and customer engagement. Virtutech therefore enables customers to manage complexity, drive improved quality and achieve higher productivity, all while lowering capital expenditure and shortening total development time.

Acquired by Intel last year, Wind River develops operating systems, middleware (software found between an OS and software application), and software design tools for a variety of embedded computing systems. Its main products include VxWorks, the market-leading proprietary and multicore-ready real-time operating system, and commercial-grade Linux software platforms. The company also provides design services and software expertise, including custom-built solutions, development tools and device testing products. With thousands of customers, Wind River technology is relied upon by most major computer and networking communications companies, and is used by corporations and government agencies such as Alcatel-Lucent, BMW, Boeing, Bombardier Transportation, Mitsubishi, Motorola, NASA, Sony, Verizon and many more.

Intel’s acquisition of privately-held Virtutech is expected to be completed this quarter. Terms of the deal are not being disclosed.

Virtualization Vet Dave Asprey Joins Trinity Ventures As EIR

————————————————————————————————————-

————————————————————————————————————-

Dave Asprey has joined Trinity Ventures as an entrepreneur-in-residence. He previously was VP of technology and corporate development with Blue Coat Systems.

Asprey’s bio, from the Trinity Ventures website:

Dave has 17 plus years of experience working in strategic planning, product management, and corporate & business development. He has worked at service provider, telecom, networking, virtualization, CDN, cloud computing, and SaaS companies, that range from small startup to Fortune 500. During that time, three of his companies were acquired, he started two early cloud computing services, he owned strategic planning for two public companies with more than $1 billion in revenue, and he ran diligence for acquisitions ranging in value from $10 million to $6 billion.

Prior to joining Trinity Ventures as an EIR, Dave was VP of Technology and VP of Business & Corporate Development at Blue Coat Systems. During his time there, he was responsible for all strategic partnerships, including Microsoft, VMware, Dell, Oracle, and SAP, contributing to about $50 million in annual revenue.

Before Blue Coat, Dave was at UK-based virtual appliance company Zeus Technology, where he was VP of Marketing and Technology Strategy. During his time at Zeus, the company grew more than 60% annually, he created Zeus’ successful cloud strategy.

Prior to Zeus, Dave owned strategic planning for Citrix’s then-$700 million virtualization business unit, reporting directly to the CTO. He was responsible for the launch of the company’s first virtual desktop broker. He joined Citrix through the acquisition of NetScaler where he was Director of Product Management for acceleration and WAN optimization. Before that, he was Senior Director of Product Management at Trinity Venture’s portfolio company Speedera Networks (now Akamai), and he spent 5 years at Exodus Communications (now Savvis), where he was a founder of the 1500 person professional services organization. During that time, he also ran the web and Internet Engineering Certification Program for the University of California at Santa Cruz.

He studied Computer Science at UCSB, Computer Information Systems at Cal State and has an MBA from Wharton.

Emulex’ OneConnect 10Gb/s Ethernet Network Adapters Certified For VMware vSphere 4

————————————————————————————————————-

————————————————————————————————————-

Emulex Corporation today announced that its OneConnect 10Gb/s Ethernet Network Adapters are certified and fully supported with VMware vSphere 4.

Utilizing Emulex’s 10Gb/s Ethernet Network Adapters, VMware vSphere 4 users will benefit from improved asset utilization, superior networking efficiency, investment protection and reduced infrastructure costs.

The OneConnect 10Gb/s Ethernet Network Adapters (OCe10102-N) support VMware NetQueue, a multi-queue performance technology that significantly improves performance in 10Gb/s Ethernet virtualized environments, enabling improved server consolidation, reduced hypervisor overhead and a dramatic increase in the number of virtual machines that can run on virtualized servers.

As part of Emulex’s single-chip, high-performance OneConnect Universal Converged Network Adapter (UCNA) product family, the OneConnect 10Gb/s Ethernet Network Adapter provides unparalleled network convergence investment protection with field enablement options for full hardware protocol offload support for Internet Small Computer System Interface (iSCSI) and Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE).

The Emulex OneConnect UCNA architecture allows IT administrators to converge their physical networks, while maintaining their application, server, storage and security administration domains. This allows companies to reduce their costs for adapters, switch ports, cabling, power and cooling without disrupting their current management structure or network segmentation configurations.

Emulex OneConnect Network Adapters, LightPulse 8Gb/s Fibre Channel Host Bus Adapters (HBAs) and Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE) CNAs are key components of the virtualized infrastructure, providing efficient, high-performance Storage Area Network (SAN) and Local Area Network (LAN) connectivity in VMware vSphere 4 environments.

Today, Emulex is a VMware Technology Alliance Partner (TAP) Program member and a participant in the VMware I/O Vendor Partner program.

Pano Logic Self-Reports Solid 2009

————————————————————————————————————-

————————————————————————————————————-

Pano Logic, zero client desktop virtualization (VDI) provider, today announced a surge in sales of its zero client computing platform in 2009, with customers rewarded with as much as 67% savings in computing total cost of ownership.

Pano Logic sales tripled last year, with strong momentum in sales among both existing and new customers for 2010. New and existing resellers realized significant financial rewards of increasing demand for Pano Logic’s innovative approach and the widespread adoption among organizations looking to reap the benefits of virtualization at the desktop that only Pano Logic can provide.

Innovative organizations are adopting Pano Logic’s zero client computing platform because it provides an easy, secure and cost-effective way to leverage virtualization and completely centralize desktop computing. Organizations in health care, education, government, manufacturing, banking, professional services and many other industries are achieving drastic reductions in management and energy costs, while eliminating desktop security breaches, all resulting in dramatic savings in TCO. In addition to cost savings, Pano Logic significantly increases end user productivity by delivering an optimal user experience and greater mobility from the ease with which users can log in and log out of their virtual machines from any zero client Pano Device within the organization.

The zero client design also uses 97 percent less electricity than a PC, resulting in dramatic reductions in energy costs and demands on the power grid. Winthrop & Weinstine, a Minneapolis-St. Paul law firm, is transitioning its PCs to Pano Logic virtual desktops and estimates it will save $10,000 annually on energy costs once their upgrade plan is complete.

Unlike any other VDI or thin client vendor, Pano Logic centralizes 100% of end user computing power onto the virtualized server. All of the processing power is managed at the server; the zero client Pano Device is completely dumb and simply connects the end user to the computing resources. With a Pano Device at the endpoint, there is no processor, no operating system, no memory, no drivers, no software and no moving parts — resulting in absolutely zero endpoint management. Also unlike any other vendor, Pano Logic provides an entire solution, including the clients, the virtualization software and management tools for deploying and managing virtual desktops. This eliminates the need to cobble together a myriad of solutions from several vendors and create complex workarounds to meet individual needs.

The growing interest and demand for Pano Logic’s solution follows a broader industry trend toward more widespread adoption of virtual desktops. Gartner predicts the worldwide hosted virtual desktop (HVD) market will accelerate through 2013 to reach 49 million units, up from more than 500,000 units in 2009, and that worldwide HVD revenue will grow from about $1.3 billion to $1.5 billion in 2009, which is less than 1 percent of the worldwide professional PC market, to $65.7 billion in 2013, which will be equal to more than 40 percent of the worldwide professional PC market.

Drawing organizations to Pano Logic’s desktop virtualization solution are a number of benefits in addition to lower overall TCO. The Pano Logic zero clients can be installed in the harshest working environments, from factory floors to toxic testing sites, and its rugged design withstands the elements while giving workers access to their personal virtual machine from any device. Security is also enhanced because of the nature of the zero clients — no processing power or local storage — and the centralized controls to manage access rights to computing, as well as to local USB drives, printers or scanners.

14 Scale Computing Products Achieve VMware Ready Status

————————————————————————————————————-

————————————————————————————————————-

Scale Computing, developer and manufacturer of Intelligent Clustered Storage (ICS) technology, announces that fourteen of its storage solutions have achieved VMware Ready status.

The designation indicates that those products have passed a detailed evaluation and testing process managed by VMware and is now listed on the VMware Hardware Compatibility List.

The list of products are: iSN1000 (iSCSI), iSN1000 (NAS),  SN1000 (NAS), SN1000 (iSCSI),  SN1000HA (iSCSI),  SN1000HA (NAS), SN2000 (NAS), SN2000 (iSCSI),  SN2000HA (NAS),  SN2000HA (iSCSI),  SN4000 (iSCSI),  SN4000 (NAS),  SN4000HA (iSCSI), and  SN4000HA (NAS).

The VMware Ready program is a VMware co-branding program for qualified partner products and is a benefit of the VMware Technology Alliance Partner (TAP) program. With more than 1200 members worldwide, the VMware TAP program works with best-of-breed technology partners to provide them a comprehensive set of VMware technical and marketing services, support, tools and expertise to deliver enhanced value to joint customers.