Citrix Combines XenDesktop, XenApp Licensing
The most important change with XenDesktop 4 is FlexCast, which is the key to delivering applications per customer requirements, said Tom Flink, vice president of worldwide channel and sales strategy for the vendor.
FlexCast allows the delivery of any application to any device on any platform, including virtual desktops, local streamed desktops, hosted blade PC desktops, hosted virtual machine-based desktops and so on. "It can handle everyone from mobile users to task workers," Flink said.
Citrix also is unveiling an important change to XenDesktop 4 by integrating a license for Citrix's XenApp, which with FlexCast allows the ability to stream any application to run on any type of customer device, Flink said.
"Now our customers can leverage all XenApp capabilities with XenDesktop all in one solution," he said. "When a customer purchases a license for XenDesktop 4, it also includes all the capabilities of XenApp. Now customers no longer need to buy both."
The new licensing deal gives customers and their solution providers the flexibility to implement the technology as they see fit, said Sumit Dhawan, vice president of product marketing for desktop virtualization at Citrix.
For example, Dhawan said, 60 percent of a customer's XenApp users may be running on virtual desktop PCs, and so they may have licenses for XenDesktop 4 that include XenApp, with the remaining 40 percent using XenApp only. However, they could all use the same applications streaming over XenApp regardless of their local devices, he said.
FlexCast gives customers the flexibility to deliver any applications to any desktop, said Ken Rindt, principal and director of sales and strategic alliances at The AEC Group, a Pittsburgh-based solution provider and Citrix partner.
"We could do it with XenApp before, but not from the VDI [virtual desktop infrastructure] aspect," he said.
That makes the idea of a single license for XenDesktop and XenApp huge, Rindt said. "This lets us work with customers on whatever solutions they need," he said. "No one else lets us do that."
The integration of XenApp into XenDesktop is important because of the need to simplify customers' IT architectures, said Emilio Fuentes, president and owner of Knowlity, a San Juan, Puerto Rico-based solution provider and Citrix partner.
No single vendor can manage every single customer, which means that customers require a variety of products, Fuentes said.
"But the ability for a single company to do VDI, application streaming, WAN acceleration -- no other company can do it all," he said.
For example, Fuentes cited a Puerto Rico telecom customer that is delivering Windows applications to Apple Macintosh users and is looking to add additional Macs as well as start implementing policies for its "bring your own PC" users.
Citrix also is enhancing XenDesktop 4 with improvements to its HDX technology that increase the performance, Flink said. The improvements include enhancements for multimedia content, realtime collaboration, USB peripherals and 3-D graphics, he said.
Also new is support for Webcams and VoIP, as well as support for branch office optimization, he said.
The new HDX capabilities reflect Citrix's ability to listen to its customers and partners, Fuentes said.
"Using XenDesktop with HDX is like using a desktop PC," he said. "The performance is great over any network. In San Juan, Puerto Rico, the network connections are not as good as in the U.S. But HDX works great."
XenDesktop 4 is slated to ship on Nov. 16. The standard edition, which does not include the XenApp license, is priced at $75 per user, per year. The enterprise addition, which includes the XenApp license and FlexCast, is priced at $225. The platinum edition, which includes full management and security capabilities, is priced at $350.
With the introduction of XenDesktop 4, Citrix is offering a promotion through June 30, 2010, under which customers can trade up their existing XenApp concurrent user licenses for twice the number of XenDesktop 4 user licenses, giving them very significant savings, Flink said.