Citrix Extends Desktop Virtualization Leadership with Acquisition of RingCube - Innovative RingCube Technology Eliminates the Tradeoff Between User Personalization and Centralized IT Management

Santa Clara, Calif. » 8/10/2011 » Citrix Systems today announced it has closed the acquisition of RingCube, a leader in user personalization technology for virtual desktops. The innovative technology from RingCube accelerates virtual desktop adoption by eliminating the tradeoff between user personalization and centralized IT management. When combined with a desktop virtualization product like Citrix XenDesktop®, RingCube makes it easier for IT to give each user a personalized virtual desktop, dramatically reduces the cost of storage, and simplifies the move from physical to virtual desktops. With the acquisition of RingCube, Citrix further solidifies its leadership position in desktop virtualization, helping enterprise customers transform traditional desktop management into a secure, flexible “private desktop cloud” service. The terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

The Great VDI Tradeoff

Enterprise customers have already begun moving to desktop virtualization. As the industry transitions from the PC Era to the Cloud Era, desktop virtualization products like Citrix XenDesktop have given millions of users around the world the freedom to access their corporate desktops, apps and data from any device, in any location. Desktop virtualization also provides significant benefits to IT, allowing them to host user desktops and apps securely in the datacenter and deliver them as a far more cost-effective centralized service.

In the past, customers using the popular VDI method of virtualization have been forced to choose between two different deployment models. Most customers today choose the “dedicated VDI” model. In this approach, IT hosts a unique, fully assembled desktop for each user in the datacenter, and lets them connect to it remotely from any device. This model gives IT all the benefits of central management while allowing end users a high level of personalization. While this approach is superior to traditional desktop management, storing thousands of unique, fully assembled desktop images in the datacenter can be expensive to maintain.

As a result, some customers opt for the more efficient “pooled VDI” model, which stores only a single image of the Windows OS and each app in the datacenter, and then dynamically assembles each virtual desktop at runtime as users need them. While the pooled approach is far less expensive, the fact that each user gets an identical desktop makes it impractical for many types of employees.

RingCube Eliminates the VDI Tradeoff

RingCube technology breaks down this barrier to enterprise-wide VDI adoption by combining all the benefits of dedicated and pooled desktops, with none of the limitations. It does this by creating a “personal vDisk” for each employee that contains only the apps, data and settings that are unique to that user. All the images that each user has in common – including the Windows OS and all common corporate apps – are stored one time in the datacenter. As a result, each user gets their own unique personal desktop each time they log in, while IT gets all the cost advantages of centrally managing a single instance of Windows and each corporate application for all users. Using RingCube technology with XenDesktop can significantly reduce storage costs versus standard dedicated VDI desktops.

RingCube also makes it easier for customers to make the move from physical to virtual desktops. By isolating all user-specific apps and settings in personal vDisks, IT can be certain that each user’s new VDI desktop will behave exactly the same as their previous physical desktop, making the move entirely transparent to users. This also simplifies migration for desktop administrators by ensuring that their existing tools for managing applications and users continue to work seamlessly.

As an added benefit, isolating each user’s unique apps and settings also gives IT the option of letting users self-install apps into their own personal vDisks.

The RingCube product line is shipping today with full support for Citrix XenDesktop 5. Additionally, Citrix will continue to support existing customers.

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Bob Schultz, Group Vice President and General Manager, Enterprise Desktops and Applications at Citrix

"The acquisition of RingCube underscores our chief goal of enabling users to access their desktops and applications on any device, and making virtual desktops simple and affordable for IT. As customers take on enterprise-wide desktop transformation initiatives, Citrix is in the best position to provide a broad range of technology delivering multiple types of virtual desktops that satisfy every user in the enterprise. RingCube technology adds a significant capability to provide users and IT flexible, personal VDI desktops at a much lower cost."