Cloud computing startup Infinite Ops Inc., of Mountlake Terrace, Wash., plans to add support for automated Citrix-based deployments to its workspace-as-a-service solution.
Currently in beta testing and expected to reach market in July, the new offering will enable MSPs and network administrators to create complete employee workspaces running on XenApp, XenDesktop, NetScaler, and other Citrix technologies with a few clicks. They can also host those workspaces on Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, or Google Cloud Platform and administer everything through a centralized management console.
The goal of the new solution, which supplements the automated cloud workspace services Infinite Ops introduced in April, is to make rolling out end user environments based on the Citrix technology stack a faster and easier process.
“It’s horribly complex to try to figure out how to get Citrix running,” says Infinite Ops CEO Michael Fraser (pictured). “We’ve made it so that the Citrix engineer no longer has to actually deploy all of the underlying Citrix components.”
According to Fraser, the new service responds to swiftly growing demand for hosted workspaces generally and Citrix-based workspaces specifically.
“Six months ago I would never have thought we’d be doing a Citrix template or that there would be a market for it, and now here we are,” he says. “This will give us additional reach to thousands of partners that are utilizing Citrix.”
It will also give those partners a greater range of hosting options than they can get through other providers, Fraser asserts, as well as the ability to deliver Citrix-free workspaces to clients that prefer other platforms.
“In the end people want cloud freedom,” Fraser says, adding that flexibility has been one of the Infinite Ops service’s most popular characteristics among channel pros since its debut.
“The fact that they can have full control on multiple different options has been front and center as the top feedback from potential prospects,” he says. The new Citrix workspace solution will feature the same rates and all-inclusive, per-user pricing scheme as those other options, he notes.
The addition of Citrix workspace support to the Infinite Ops platform comes amid a major strategic push by Citrix itself into the workspace-as-a-service market and just weeks after that company showcased new workspace-related product enhancements at its annual Synergy user and partner conference in Las Vegas. Fraser sees moves like that as indicative of rapidly mounting industry momentum away from virtual desktop services towards more customizable and mobile-friendly online workspaces.
“That’s where it’s all going,” he says. “It’s not really a VDI play anymore.”
Coming next from Infinite Ops will be an automated solution enabling users to build and maintain on-premises virtual server installations utilizing VMware technologies.
“VMware is almost a mandatory requirement for on-prem deployments, and so that’s going to be our next major component into our platform,” Fraser says. Targeted primarily at enterprise IT departments and service providers that operate their own data center, that service is scheduled to launch in August or September.
