DaaS – Digital IT News

5 VDI and DaaS Alternatives to Citrix and Omnissa

Olivia Rowan — Thu, 10 Oct 2024 14:30:05 +0000

In recent years, the landscape of virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) and Desktop as a Service (DaaS) has been marked by significant shifts and disruptions, prompting organizations to reevaluate their current providers and solutions. For customers of Citrix and Omnissa, who have faced challenges adapting to these changes, the need for reliable and cost-effective alternatives has become more pressing.

As companies strive to optimize their operations and reduce the long-term costs associated with virtual desktop environments, exploring new options becomes imperative. This article will guide you through four viable VDI and DaaS alternatives that not only promise stability and less disruption but also aim to deliver enhanced performance and scalability, making them worthy of consideration for any organization looking to transition from their current setup.

We asked five companies – Parallels, Nerdio, Anunta, Cybele Software and Workspot- the same questions and here are their responses. Whether you’re grappling with service inconsistencies, seeking better cost management, or simply exploring state-of-the-art capabilities, these options stand out as practical solutions in a rapidly evolving digital workspace landscape.

Parallels

parallels.com

What product/s do you offer that would be alternatives to Citrix and Omnissa solutions including Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops or Omnissa Horizon 8?

At Parallels, we offer a range of solutions that serve as strong alternatives to Citrix and Omnissa. For flexible application and desktop delivery, we provide Parallels RAS and Parallels Secure Workspace. These solutions offer robust access to applications via VDI and have attracted many customers transitioning from Citrix due to their ease of use and cost-efficiency.

This year, we also introduced Parallels DaaS—a cloud-native alternative to Citrix and Omnissa solutions—and Parallels Browser Isolation, which enhances security by safeguarding remote access to SaaS applications. As secure access to applications and data becomes increasingly critical, this new offering is designed to meet those demands effectively.

And of course, many know us for Parallels Desktop, our virtualization solution that allows users to run multiple OSs on a single device – like Windows on Mac.

With our diverse product portfolio, we provide reliable and flexible alternatives to Citrix and Omnissa, catering to a wide range of use cases and ensuring that our solutions meet the evolving needs of organizations.

What advantages do your products offer compared to these Citrix and Omnissa products?

One of the key reasons customers choose Parallels solutions over Citrix or Omnissa is the almost elegant simplicity of the technology and the associated time to value. They like the ease of use, deployment, and management. For example, one of our channel partners XenTegra One recently said that “Administration is 10 times easier. If a client needs assistance, a call is set up and at most takes 20 minutes to show them the ins and outs. A couple of quick trainings and the IT admin is up to speed.”.

This is especially important given the current shortage of IT specialists. Companies can’t afford to wait months for IT professionals to get up to speed. With our solutions, IT admins can get on board fast, without costly and extensive technical ramp time.

That simplicity extends to our licensing model, as well, and we believe that’s a significant advantage compared to Citrix or Omnissa.

Our all-inclusive licensing model offers clear, predictable pricing with no hidden costs. Deployment and maintenance also tend to be more affordable compared to other solutions for reasons we have already discussed.

It’s also worth noting that we support a wide range of hypervisors and cloud providers, allowing customers to leverage existing infrastructure and minimize disruption to the existing environment.

Whether on-premises or in the cloud, our solutions cover everything under one license, with the flexibility to scale up or down as the organization grows.

How many desktops are currently running your product/s?

Although we cannot share specific numbers publicly, we can proudly say that our products are widely adopted and used by numerous satisfied customers globally.

Do you have particular vertical markets or use cases that are most appropriate for your product/s?

We sell almost entirely through channel partners who serve customers in a variety of industries that need reliable, secure, and scalable solutions for delivering virtual desktops and applications. From a market segment perspective, we enjoy genuine strength and pedigree among small to mid-sized businesses, mid-market organizations, state and local governments, and educational institutions. Within our commercial segments, we work extensively within the healthcare industry – with deep expertise in the Electronic Medical Records (EMR) space.

For example, Aspire Indiana switched from Citrix to our solution because they needed a more affordable and less complex option for their virtualization needs. With Parallels RAS, Aspire Indiana was able to deliver secure, remote access to EMR applications through an HTML5 gateway. Like many customers, they were impressed with the simplicity and user-friendly features of our solution. We’re implementing this same scenario for dozens of customers globally, including some of the biggest names in the industry.

Beyond healthcare, we also serve a number of notable financial services organizations, manufacturing customers, as well as clients in the retail and customer service industries. Again, the flexibility and ease of deployment of our solutions make them a great fit for organizations of all sizes and across various industries.

Are there any infrastructure limitations or specifics that new customers should be aware of to run your product/s?

Our products have been on the market for a long time and have evolved into mature solutions that offer exceptional flexibility and compatibility. They are designed to integrate seamlessly with a wide range of IT environments, ensuring they meet the diverse needs of any organization.

Take Parallels RAS as an example. Initially launched as “2X Application Server” in 2006, it has since evolved into a highly flexible solution that works closely with a wide array of popular technology partners and integrations. Just to list a few: It’s accessible across a variety of devices, giving users the flexibility to access resources via HTML5-compliant browsers or through the Parallels Client application, which supports platforms including Windows, Linux, macOS, iOS, Android, and ChromeOS. It also supports all major hypervisors, from Microsoft Hyper-V and VMware ESXi to hyperconverged infrastructures like Nutanix Acropolis and Scale Computing HC3. Whether on-premises, in the cloud (such as Microsoft Azure or Amazon Web Services), or through a hybrid approach, organizations can create a highly adaptable IT infrastructure based on their unique needs.

Furthermore, we actively gather and implement feedback and requests from our customers. Many features in our products have been directly shaped by customer input, ensuring our products continually evolve to meet real-world needs.

Are you offering any programs or incentives for channel partners that migrate their customers from Citrix or Omnissa to your product/s?

Definitely! We recently launched an attractive promotion offering rebates to partners who migrate customers from Citrix to Parallels. Right now, and until the end of November 2024, Parallels is offering customers one free year of Parallels RAS, Parallels Secure Workspace, or Parallels DaaS licensing as part of a three-year pre-purchased subscription with a suggested promotional standard retail price of USD 50,000 or greater. Plus, customers who enter into a three-year pre-purchased subscription with a suggested promotional standard retail price of USD 100,000 or greater can also benefit from deployment and migration assistance from their certified partners. These partners will get a rebate from Parallels for such assistance.

With this promotion, we aim to make the transition from Citrix to Parallels workspace solutions as seamless and beneficial as possible for both our partners and customers.

Apart from this promotion, we support our partners with a comprehensive partner program. There are several levels available, offering a range of benefits such as deal registration, visibility on our Partner Locator, free NFR licenses, financial support for marketing activities, free training and certification on all of our products, and many other advantages.

What is your licensing structure?

Our licensing structure is straightforward and transparent, with no hidden fees. All Parallels products come with an all-inclusive single license model, giving access to a full-featured set of capabilities. This means customers don’t have to purchase a premium license at a premium price just to get a single feature.

We offer both prepaid and postpaid concurrent user licensing models. The postpaid option is specifically targeted at service providers and ISVs.

Is there any additional information that customers considering their virtual desktop or DaaS options should know about your product/s?

One unique aspect of Parallels is our ability to offer a comprehensive platform of solutions not only for server and cloud, but also for the desktop. This enables us to cater to whatever the customer needs.

We’ve recently implemented a hub-and-spoke model, centralizing control through a robust control plane (the hub) that connects all Parallels products across endpoints, servers, and the cloud (the spokes). Parallels DaaS and Parallels Browser Isolation are the first two services in this model, launched earlier this year.

This milestone is a significant step toward our vision of a centralized hub for all Parallels products, streamlining operations for administrators, and ensuring a cohesive user experience. Customers and partners can confidently rely on Parallels to securely access a wide range of applications, including legacy, cloud, and desktop applications, all within our holistic platform of secure workspace solutions.

Our strategic Parallels platform empowers customers and partners to navigate the evolving end-user computing and security landscape with confidence.

2. Nerdio

getnerdio.com

What product(s) do you offer that would be alternatives to Citrix and Omnissa solutions, including Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops or Omnissa Horizon 8?

Nerdio Manager for Enterprise (NME) and Nerdio Manager for MSP (NMM) offer robust alternatives to Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops and Omnissa Horizon 8. Both products are designed to manage Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD) environments, streamlining the deployment and management of virtual desktops and remote apps on Microsoft Azure. They provide a simplified, cost-effective, and flexible cloud-native approach.

What advantages do your products offer compared to these Citrix and Omnissa products?

Lower Cost: Nerdio products are optimized for cost savings by automating Azure resource management, ensuring you only pay for what you use.
Ease of Use: Both NME and NMM are known for their intuitive interfaces, which simplify the deployment, scaling, and management of virtual desktops compared to the complex architectures of Citrix and Omnissa.
Cloud-Native: Nerdio is built specifically for Microsoft Azure, leveraging native Azure technologies without the need for third-party brokers or controllers, unlike Citrix and Horizon.
Flexibility: With seamless integration into the Microsoft ecosystem, Nerdio products provide flexible, multi-tenant or hybrid-cloud environments, and can be deployed in a fraction of the time it takes with Citrix or Horizon.

How many desktops are currently running your product(s)?

Over three million Azure Virtual Desktops are under management between Nerdio Manager for Enterprise and Nerdio Manager for MSP across a wide range of industries globally. Nerdio continues to grow rapidly, with significant adoption among organizations looking to simplify their Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD) management.

Do you have particular vertical markets or use cases that are most appropriate for your product(s)?

Healthcare, Financial Services, Government, Education, and Professional Services have seen significant benefits from Nerdio’s products. Remote work enablement, hybrid cloud infrastructure, compliance-heavy environments, and secure virtual desktop solutions for regulated industries are ideal use cases. Additionally, companies undergoing digital transformation and migrating from on-premise infrastructure find Nerdio particularly suitable.

Are there any infrastructure limitations or specifics that new customers should be aware of to run your product(s)?

Nerdio requires a Microsoft Azure infrastructure as it leverages native Azure services. While the product is optimized for Azure, customers should have sufficient cloud infrastructure in place to support virtual desktop deployment. New customers should be prepared for integrating their existing identity management (like Entra ID), security policies, and networking into Azure to fully leverage Nerdio’s capabilities.

Are you offering any programs or incentives for channel partners that migrate their customers from Citrix or Omnissa to your product(s)?

Yes, Nerdio offers incentive programs for channel partners, including special pricing, marketing support, and training to assist with customer migrations from Citrix or Omnissa solutions. These programs aim to empower partners with the tools needed for seamless migrations and successful onboarding of their customers.

Are there programs or incentives for end customers switching from Citrix or Omnissa to your product(s)?

Nerdio provides migration assistance programs and discounted pricing for end customers switching from Citrix or Omnissa. Additionally, customers may benefit from free migration tools and onboarding support to ensure a smooth transition from legacy systems.

What is your licensing structure?

Nerdio offers a per-user or per-customer/tenant licensing structure, depending on the product (NME or NMM). This licensing model is designed to be flexible, allowing customers to scale based on their actual usage and needs. Subscription-based pricing ensures that customers can optimize their cloud spend as they grow.

Is there any additional information that customers considering their virtual desktop or DaaS options should know about your product(s)?

Nerdio stands out due to its deep integration with Microsoft Azure, enabling native Azure Virtual Desktop management, robust automation features, and extensive cost optimization tools. Customers transitioning to Nerdio benefit from:

Fast deployment: 75% faster setup time than traditional solutions.
Comprehensive support: Dedicated customer success teams and technical experts ensure seamless implementation and scaling.
Innovation: Continuous product improvements, including new features around Microsoft Modern Work, ensure that customers are always operating on the latest technology.

3. Anunta

anuntatech.com

What product/s do you offer that would be alternatives to Citrix and Omnissa solutions including Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops or Omnissa Horizon 8?

Anunta works with the client to assess their business and tech infrastructure needs and recommend solutions that integrate seamlessly with products from our OEM partners. Our approach provides robust virtual desktop and application delivery services, serving as an effective alternative to popular virtual apps and desktops.

What advantages do your products offer compared to these Citrix and Omnissa products?

Anunta’s approach delivers business value via customized deployments, enhanced performance, and scalability. As platform agnostic, we offer flexibility and optimization based on specific business needs, ensuring a tailored experience that meets various operational requirements for our clients.

How many desktops are currently running your product/s?

At Anunta, we offer solutions across the Digital Workspace to positively impact the Digital Employee Experience (DEX). We specialize in supporting desktop infrastructure across on-prem and cloud (virtual, private, and public) environments. We offer solutions through our partnerships with leading OEMs. While our expertise is in new installations and migrations from one technology to another, several partners have recognized us for our support and maintenance (Day2) offerings.

Do you have particular vertical markets or use cases that are most appropriate for your product/s?

We cater to various industries, including BFSI, Healthcare, Manufacturing, Airline, Retail, and Education. Our solutions are particularly effective for organizations requiring secure, scalable, and efficient remote access for their teams.

Are there any infrastructure limitations or specifics that new customers should be aware of to run your product/s?

Customers should know that infrastructure requirements can vary based on the chosen OEM technology. We provide a thorough health assessment of the existing environment to ensure optimal performance.

Are you offering any programs or incentives for channel partners that migrate their customers from Citrix or Omnissa to your product/s?

We work with our OEM partners to design incentive programs to ease the decision-making process for clients to migrate from Citrix or Omnissa to other technologies.

Are there programs or incentives for end customers switching from Citrix or Omnissa to your product?

End customers migrating from Citrix or Omnissa can benefit from our tailored transition programs, which may include promotional pricing, deployment support, and dedicated consultation to ensure a seamless switch

What is your licensing structure?

Our licensing model is flexible and designed to meet diverse customer needs. Based on the selected OEM solutions and the customer’s usage requirements, specific details can be discussed.

Is there any additional information that customers considering their virtual desktop or DaaS options should know about your product/s?

We recommend that customers consider the importance of end user experience and support in their virtual desktop journey. Our team is dedicated to providing comprehensive support and guidance throughout the implementation process.

4. Cybele Software

cybelesoft.com

What product/s do you offer that would be alternatives to Citrix and Omnissa solutions including Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops or Omnissa Horizon 8?

Cybele Software offers Thinfinity Workspace as a robust alternative to Citrix and Omnissa Horizon 8. Thinfinity Workspace provides solutions for application virtualization, virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI), and Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA), making it a comprehensive alternative to Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops and Omnissa Horizon. Additionally, Thinfinity Cloud Manager enables seamless management of virtual desktops and applications across multiple cloud platforms (Azure, AWS, GCP, IONOS) and hypervisors (VMware, Hyper-V, Proxmox).

What advantages do your products offer compared to these Citrix and Omnissa products? Thinfinity Workspace provides several key advantages:

Simplified Deployment: Thinfinity offers cloud-native and multi-cloud deployment, without the complex infrastructure required by Citrix and Omnissa.
Cost-Effective: Thinfinity’s lightweight infrastructure reduces costs compared to Citrix and Omnissa, which often require substantial hardware investments and licensing fees.
Zero Trust Security: Thinfinity’s ZTNA model ensures secure access without the need for VPNs or inbound ports, streamlining security management compared to traditional solutions.
Cross-Platform Access: Thinfinity supports browser-based access across any device without the need for client installations, enhancing user experience and accessibility.
Automation and Scalability: Thinfinity Cloud Manager automates provisioning, scaling, and management of virtual desktops, offering improved flexibility and reduced operational overhead.

How many desktops are currently running your product/s?

Thinfinity solutions have been deployed in over 5000 organizations worldwide, supporting hundreds of thousands of virtual desktops across various industries. The platform continues to grow, scaling to meet the demands of enterprises, educational institutions, and government entities.

Do you have particular vertical markets or use cases that are most appropriate for your product/s?

Thinfinity Workspace is ideal for various industries, including:

Healthcare: Secure access to electronic health records and specialized applications.
Education: Virtual classrooms and remote access to campus resources for students and faculty.
Engineering and Design: GPU-accelerated software for CAD and graphic design.
Finance: Secure desktop access for financial applications with strict compliance needs.
Government and Legal: Secure application delivery and remote desktop access for confidential documentation.
Oil and Gas: Remote access to specialized simulation software, geospatial data, and compliance-focused applications for managing exploration and drilling operations. This often involves intensive graphics processing, secure data transfer, and access to OT (Operational Technology) networks for monitoring and controlling physical processes, like drilling equipment and pipelines.
OT Networks: Thinfinity’s solutions integrate with OT networks, providing secure remote access to critical industrial systems, ensuring compliance, performance, and security for sectors like manufacturing, utilities, and energy where remote monitoring and real-time control are paramount.
Independent Software Vendors (ISVs): ISVs can leverage Thinfinity to transform legacy Windows-based applications into modern, SaaS offerings without rewriting the software. By virtualizing and delivering these applications directly through the browser, ISVs can offer their clients cloud-based access, improving scalability, reducing deployment complexity, and modernizing their software delivery.

Are there any infrastructure limitations or specifics that new customers should be aware of to run your product/s?

Thinfinity is a cloud-agnostic solution, meaning it can be deployed across on-premises, hybrid, and cloud environments, including AWS, Azure, GCP, IONOS, and other major hypervisors like VMware, Hyper-V, and Proxmox. Thinfinity’s lightweight architecture is optimized for efficiency, typically requiring up to 50% less infrastructure than traditional solutions such as Horizon 8. This makes Thinfinity an attractive alternative, offering scalability with lower hardware demands, reducing operational costs, and simplifying deployment across diverse environments. With its flexible deployment options, Thinfinity can adapt to varying customer infrastructure needs, from small-scale operations to enterprise-level deployments.

Are you offering any programs or incentives for channel partners that migrate their customers from Citrix or Omnissa to your product/s?

Yes, we offer partner incentive programs that reward channel partners for migrating their clients from Citrix or Omnissa to Thinfinity solutions. These programs often include discounted licensing for the first year, training resources, and marketing support to ease the transition and accelerate adoption.

Are there programs or incentives for end customers switching from Citrix or Omnissa to your product?

Yes, for end customers, Thinfinity provides migration assistance, discounted licensing for, and free consulting services to ensure a smooth transition from Citrix or Omnissa platforms. Additionally, we offer a free trial to allow organizations to evaluate Thinfinity before making a final decision.

What is your licensing structure?

Thinfinity’s licensing structure is flexible, offering both subscription-based and perpetual licensing models depending on the organization’s needs. Licensing can be purchased per concurrent user, per named user, or based on usage, making it adaptable for businesses of all sizes. Pricing tiers are also available for cloud, hybrid, and on-premises deployments.

Is there any additional information that customers considering their virtual desktop or DaaS options should know about your product/s?

Thinfinity Workspace is designed to be future-proof and highly flexible, supporting deployment options on-premises, hybrid, or fully as-a-service. Built with a cloud-native architecture, it offers multi-cloud support and automation via Infrastructure as Code (IaC), enabling organizations to standardize VDI across cloud platforms and on-premises environments. Thinfinity helps businesses achieve cloud cost reduction and control through automation, optimizing resource usage and minimizing operational overhead.

One of its key advantages is avoiding vendor lock-in, allowing businesses the freedom to choose between cloud providers such as AWS, Azure, GCP, IONOS, or major hypervisors like VMware, Hyper-V, and Proxmox. Thinfinity’s Zero Trust Security framework ensures secure, reliable access, while its automation capabilities significantly reduce manual management, delivering a seamless experience for IT teams and end users alike. Whether organizations are transitioning to DaaS or need advanced application virtualization, Thinfinity provides a scalable, cost-effective solution that can adapt to any deployment model.

5. Workspot

https://www.workspot.com/

1. What product/s do you offer that would be alternatives to Citrix and Omnissa solutions including Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops or Omnissa Horizon 8?

Workspot offers a unified digital workplace for the secure delivery of virtual apps, virtual desktops, and web apps from VMs located within on-premises data centers or any combination of the AWS, Azure, or Google clouds.

2. What advantages do your products offer compared to these Citrix and Omnissa products?

The Workspot unified digital workplace allows customers to deliver a secure browser, virtual apps and desktops from a unified cloud-native platform. The platform also provides IT unified observability to optimize user digital experience (DEX), lower cost, and increase security.

3. How many desktops are currently running your product/s?

As a private company, we do not disclose our user count.

4. Do you have particular vertical markets or use cases that are most appropriate for your product/s?

The use cases we see commonly include 3D CAD designers, software developers, contractors, call centers, and remote employees. Popular vertical markets include (but not limited to) financial services, healthcare, retail, manufacturing, higher education, and architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) employ our solutions.

5. Are there any infrastructure limitations or specifics that new customers should be aware of to run your product/s?

Workspot enables the user to leverage an endpoint device of their choice, including Windows, Macs, iOS, Android, Linux and a web client.
Workspot also enables companies to deliver their virtual desktops and apps from their on-premises data center and/or any cloud, e.g., Azure, AWS or GCP.

6. Are you offering any programs or incentives for channel partners that migrate their customers from Citrix or Omnissa to your product/s?

Yes, Workspot has a program that enables a customer to take their first use case live in 45 days. If the customer migrates to the cloud, there are significant incentives from the IaaS provider.

7. Are there programs or incentives for end customers switching from Citrix or Omnissa to your product?

The biggest reason customers are looking to switch is due to the higher costs of both their server and desktop virtualization platforms. Workspot enables its customers to switch within their existing budget, and in many cases saves between 57%-65% in total cost of ownership.

8. Is there any additional information that customers considering their virtual desktop or DaaS options should know about your product/s?

Workspot’s platform was engineered for simplicity. Many customers are surprised at the speed at which they migrate onto a future-proof platform, and the ease of overall single-console management and operation thereafter.

Promotion Rebates for Partners Migrating Customers from Citrix to Parallels

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Parallels Named Visionary in the 2024 Gartner Magic Quadrant for DaaS

Taylor Graham — Mon, 23 Sep 2024 15:00:04 +0000

Parallels announced its recognition as a Visionary in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Desktop as a Service. After being listed as an Honorable Mention in the 2023 report, this marks the first time Parallels has been included as a positioned vendor within the Magic Quadrant.

Parallels DaaS is a cloud-native, Desktop-as-a-Service (DaaS) solution that offers users secure and seamless access to their virtual applications and desktop environments anytime, anywhere. Parallels is identified as a Visionary in Gartner’s evaluation for its Ability to Execute and Completeness of Vision.

While Parallels DaaS is a new offering, it benefits from Parallels’ extensive experience in Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) through its more mature Parallels RAS (Remote Application Server) solution. Parallels RAS (Remote Application Server) is a flexible virtual application and desktop delivery solution providing a unified management platform that enables on-premises VDI, hybrid environments, cloud PCs, and physical endpoints.

A Gartner Magic Quadrant is a culmination of research in a specific market, giving end users a wide-angle view of the relative positions of the market’s competitors.

“We believe that our position as a Visionary in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Desktop as a Service is not only an accomplishment for Parallels, but also a testament to our commitment to simplifying the management of virtual machines and meeting the demands of the market,” said Prashant Ketkar, CTO at Parallels. “With Parallels DaaS, organizations receive an intuitive, user-friendly solution with simple licensing without sacrificing scalability and security.”

Learn more about Parallels and see why the company was recognized as a Visionary in the 2024 Gartner Magic Quadrant for DaaS at the website here.

Promotion Rebates for Partners Migrating Customers from Citrix to Parallels

Gartner Attribution & Disclaimer
Gartner, Magic Quadrant for Desktop as a Service, By Stuart Downes, Eri Hariu, Mark Margevicius, Craig Fisler, Sunil Kumar, 16 September.

Gartner and Magic Quadrant are registered trademarks of Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and internationally and are used herein with permission. All rights reserved. Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings or other designation. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner’s research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.

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Hybrid Work Model Implementations Eased with VMware

Taylor Graham — Wed, 31 Aug 2022 22:10:29 +0000

A majority of companies have implemented or plan to implement a hybrid work model moving forward.⁽¹⁾ However, supporting a hybrid work model creates new speed bumps for IT. VMware outlined how autonomous workspaces powered by data science will ease this burden. It also unveiled innovations across its Anywhere Workspace platform that will inject automation into organizations’ end-user computing environments, enabling IT teams to do more with less.

“The reality of hybrid work is each employee, and each device is a front door into the organization and its resources. IT must not only make that front door secure, but also welcoming as employees access apps from anywhere. The only way IT teams will be able to support hybrid work is by implementing simplified, unified, and automated processes,” said Shankar Iyer, senior vice president and general manager, End-User Computing, VMware. “Autonomous Workspaces represent the next evolution of managing digital workspaces, and VMware is once again pioneering the path forward for organizations.”

Journey to Autonomous Workspaces

According to Gartner®, “By 2027, unified endpoint management and digital employee experience tools will converge to drive autonomous endpoint management, reducing human effort by at least 40%.”⁽²⁾At VMware Explore 2022 US, VMware will outline the journey of digital workspace from being manual and task-centric to an outcomes-driven autonomous workspace. The future of hybrid work will drive an evolution of the digital workspace – one that injects data science and proactive automations across endpoint management, security and end-user experience. This will enable a context-aware autonomous workspace that delivers a few primary outcomes:

Self-configuring: Workspaces are configured to a desired state instead of constantly monitoring for changes and enforcing reactive policies.
Self-healing: The solution intelligently detect and isolate end-user experience incidents, accelerate change management, and automatically remediate issues to normal working state.
Self-securing: The solution can take proactive actions to better secure workspace access, quarantine apps or devices, and remediate anomalies to enable a return to desired posture.

Innovations Across Anywhere Workspace

VMware Anywhere Workspace will include all tools needed to deliver autonomous workspaces.

At VMware Explore, VMware unveiled how it is advancing self-configuring, self-healing and self-securing outcomes across four key technology areas that are delivered by the Anywhere Workspace platform:

VDI and DaaS
Digital Employee Experience
Unified Endpoint Management
Security

VDI and DaaS

Hybrid work is driving demand for multi-cloud VDI. VMware is introducing a next generation of VMware Horizon Cloud that will enable multi-cloud agility and flexibility. This new release represents a major update to Horizon Cloud on Microsoft Azure that can dramatically simplify the infrastructure that needs to be deployed inside customer environments, reducing infrastructure costs in some cases by over 70% while increasing scalability and reliability of VMware’s DaaS platform.⁽³⁾

The new “Thin Edge” infrastructure continues to leverage the Horizon Control plane–a VMware-managed service that includes hybrid support and features like app management, universal brokering, image management, monitoring, and more. Plus, this next-gen Horizon Cloud is API-driven, so customers, partners, and ISVs will be able to build tools, services, and automations. Customers with Horizon subscription licenses are entitled to the new and improved Horizon Cloud at no additional charge.

VMware will also introduce VMware Horizon Managed Desktop – a flexible, cloud-hosted service that delivers fully-managed virtual desktops and apps with choice of deployment options: on-premises, hybrid or public cloud. This will better enable secure access for a distributed workforce for wherever work takes them. The solution relieves IT teams from time-consuming operations, provides cost-management with predictable OpEx spending, speeds deployments for faster time to value, and rapidly scales to meet changing workforce demands.

Additionally, Google and VMware are collaborating to bring access to any app on any device for the hybrid workforce. Organizations will be able to use hundreds of certified endpoints to connect to Horizon virtual desktops and apps. And now, with Google Chromebook as a validated endpoint, industries like healthcare can benefit from delivering a great user experience for more secure access to corporate resources.

“We rely on VMware Horizon to support access to corporate resources for our employees,” said Yehoshua Israel, IT director, Aperion Care, Inc. “In conversation with the Google product team, we learned that ChromeOS is a good fit to connect to Horizon for our environment, and our time from unboxing to ready for deployment is about three minutes. Using a managed guest session, the ChromeOS system is simple to use, locked down, HIPAA-compliant, and inexpensive. The transition from Windows-based laptops to Chromebooks with Horizon has been seamless.”

Digital Employee Experience

VMware is broadening the coverage of its Digital Employee Experience solutions beyond Workspace ONE UEM managed devices to now include VMware Horizon and third-party managed and unmanaged devices. This will result in increased support of remote, hybrid and frontline personas.

And, to support the rising number of devices used by frontline employees, VMware is introducing a Digital Employee Experience Management (DEEM) solutions pack for customers with frontline deployments. These out-of-the box dashboards span ROI, shared-device usage, device loss, critical application performance, and more, to measure and improve mission-critical deployments.

Finally, VMware Workspace ONE is introducing DEEM Guided Root Cause Analysis capabilities. With the increase in hybrid work, organizations have struggled to scale the helpdesk to support more devices, apps, and networks. With this new feature, machine learning algorithms will help IT correlate all the relevant data points to recommend possible causes with probability assigned; enabling IT to solve issues more quickly, create automations to prevent other users from experiencing the issue, and restore productivity for impacted employees.

Unified Endpoint Management (UEM)

VMware continues to roll out advanced UEM capabilities now supporting multi-platform automation and orchestration with the expansion of Workspace ONE Freestyle Orchestrator to mobile devices and third-party apps. Freestyle Orchestrator – a modern, no-/low-code automation framework in UEM – provides support for Windows and Mac desktop operating systems. Since its launch, the tool has seen a significant adoption with more than 26 million automation runs that are designed to help IT teams eliminate complex and manual configurations tasks. Freestyle Orchestrator continues to offer administrators the flexibility to create these automation workflows to fit specific process requirements for their organization, and now with the extended platform support, expected to further increase IT efficiency and productivity.

VMware is also driving innovation by adding platform breadth of support and depth of management in its industry-recognized UEM solution. Additional UEM enhancements now include availability of multi-user mode for Windows OS – a use case that has seen significant adoption in both frontline shared use and in-office device loaner or hoteling scenarios as employees return to work. VMware is also announcing availability in this quarter of a distribution-agnostic Linux endpoint solution, XR Hub for AR/VR devices; and Tech Previews of its next-gen Windows Update management, support for new Chrome OS APIs for Education, work profile on Android AMAPI, and a dynamic, data-driven UI for iOS and Windows day-1 new policy support.

Workspace Security

Earlier this year, VMware announced a key innovation in the form of Workspace ONE Mobile Threat Defense. Today’s mobile threat landscape is diverse, and mobile workstyles call for specialized protection from phishing and application, device, and rogue network originated threats. VMware Workspace ONE Mobile Threat Defense, an add-on to the Workspace ONE UEM platform, takes mobile protection to the next level. Specifically, the solution addresses application-based threats, Web and content vulnerabilities, Zero-day threats and device vulnerabilities, and more.

VMware Cross-Cloud services Helps Customers Navigate the Multi-Cloud Era

At VMware Explore 2022, VMware is unveiling new and enhanced offerings for VMware Cross-Cloud services to help customers navigate the multi-cloud era with freedom, flexibility and security. VMware Cross-Cloud services is a portfolio of cloud services that deliver a unified and simplified way to build, operate, access, and better secure any application on any cloud from any device. VMware Cross-Cloud service pillars include 1) App Platform 2) Cloud Management 3) Cloud & Edge Infrastructure 4) Security & Networking, and 5) Anywhere Workspace.

About VMware Explore

VMware Explore is an evolution of the company’s flagship conference, VMworld. VMware Explore aims to be the industry’s go-to-event for all things multi-cloud. This year, it will feature industry-led solution and technical sessions, an extensive ecosystem of 90% of the top cloud partners, a thriving marketplace of multi-cloud ISVs and several networking events.

This article may contain hyperlinks to non-VMware websites that are created and maintained by third parties who are solely responsible for the content on such websites.

Zippia, Future of Work 2022 Hybrid Work Statistics, February 2022
Gartner, Magic Quadrant for Unified Endpoint Management Tools, Tom Cipolla, Dan Wilson, Chris Silva, Craig Fisler, August 1, 2022
VMware Internal Analysis, Beta customer internal cost estimator, August 2022

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Honeywell Teams with IGEL to Deploy Advanced Virtualization and Process Automation

Leigh Porter — Thu, 28 Oct 2021 18:24:57 +0000

Honeywell announced it will work with IGEL to deploy solutions for Experion® Process Knowledge System (PKS) users through the IGEL Ready Program. The Linux-based solution, Honeywell’s Universal Thin Client Operating System, will allow Experion PKS users to access an ecosystem of cutting-edge hardware and software, delivering a powerful, productive and secure end-user experience with advanced virtualization and process automation.

As industrial organizations look for more efficient ways to approach control system engineering, the need for a solution that can be adopted incrementally and used interchangeably with existing systems and infrastructure is of paramount importance. The Universal Thin Client Operating System will allow Experion PKS users to securely deploy a purpose-built thin client operating system with a rich management experience, while providing endpoint devices the peripheral and connectivity features needed for Experion PKS.

“Leveraging the IGEL Ready program, this collaboration will further advance Honeywell’s position as an industry leader in process control virtualization. IGEL’s edge operating system provides a secure, Linux-based thin client platform for Experion PKS while providing rich remote management capabilities that improve the lifecycle experience,” said Joe Bastone, Director, Experion Offering Management.

“By teaming together, Honeywell and IGEL are better able to deliver world-class solutions that meet our mutual customers’ requirements, as the IGEL Ready program was designed to foster collaboration and joint-solution development,” said Divya Saggar, Director, IGEL Ready.

The solution provides a secure experience for end-users using virtualization while significantly reducing the challenges traditionally associated with deploying thin client technology. The Universal Thin Client Operating System also allows for much stronger administration and management capabilities, which in turn allows users to save time and labor costs associated with maintaining their control systems.

For more information about the Universal Thin Client Operating System and Experion, https://www.honeywellprocess.com/experionpkshive.

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Flexxible IT Delivers Desktop-as-a-Service Anywhere with FlexxDesktop

Olivia Rowan — Wed, 27 Oct 2021 23:32:34 +0000

Flexxible IT has officially announced the release of FlexxDesktop, a Desktop as a Service (DaaS) solution where edge computing and cloud computing converge. This allows virtual desktops to run anywhere or everywhere. With the end user’s experience at the center, FlexxDesktop offers DaaS on the users’ terms, with no up-front investment, and enables the seamless transition from any platform to any platform, whether the data center or the cloud.

“Flexxible IT has been a leader in the DaaS space since 2008, and we are excited to expand our reach to support customers staying or moving to any vendor or any cloud,” said Sebastian Prat, CEO at Flexxible IT. “We see FlexxDesktop as the future of DaaS, enabling the enterprise to build their own DaaS solution on their terms where they can pay-as-they-go and transition to any vendor or cloud at their pace. It allows the enterprise to choose the vendors they see fit and to migrate seamlessly between them.”

FlexxDesktop is available today in a subscription pricing model, so it allows enterprises to migrate existing environments to any cloud with ease at a cost that is OPEX friendly. Many DaaS vendors lock customers to a single platform or cloud. The cloud may not be feasible for some, and the customer will still need the data center. FlexxDesktop enables DaaS to enhance the digital experience for any end-user through a simplified management architecture built for any cloud or any data center.

“FlexxDesktop enables enterprises to have a choice,” said Pete Downing, CMO at Flexxible IT. “DaaS is complex and FlexxDesktop aims to simplify the day-to-day management as well as give enterprises the choice to use any vendor, their data center, their edge, and any cloud.”

Flexxible IT is giving an overview and highlight on the key features of FlexxDesktop via a webinar on November 3, 2021, at 11:00 AM EST. You can register here.

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Veridium Joins IGEL Ready Program as a Technology Partner

Taylor Graham — Fri, 21 May 2021 19:56:07 +0000

Veridium, a leading developer of frictionless, passwordless authentication solutions, and IGEL, provider of the next-gen edge OS for cloud workspaces, announced that Veridium has joined the IGEL Ready program as a technology partner. IGEL Ready is an ecosystem of cutting-edge hardware, software and peripheral solutions that have been verified for use with the IGEL OS to deliver a powerful, productive, and secure user experience.

As a validated solution in the security segment of the IGEL Ready program, VeridiumID delivers passwordless authentication for VDI (Virtual Desktop Infrastructure), DaaS (Desktop as a Service) and cloud workspaces. It enables organizations to eliminate passwords and/or legacy OTP token technology for user authentication. This enhances security and user experience while also reducing operating costs. The software-only platform has a front-end mobile application available from public stores or as a software development kit (SDK) and enables a broad variety of explicit and implicit authenticators to meet all customer and regulatory requirements.

“Veridium is excited to join the active and growing community of IGEL Ready partners,” said Ismet Geri, Chief Executive Officer, Veridium. “Device authentication is a critical component to any security strategy and is particularly important at the endpoint – whether in the cloud, VDI or DaaS. By validating VeridiumID for use with IGEL OS-powered devices, we are helping to provide a simple, yet powerful layer of security to safeguard applications and data from growing cyber threats.”

“The future of work requires secure access to cloud workspaces from anywhere on any device,” said Jed Ayres, Chief Executive Officer, IGEL. “Logging into corporate resources needs to be done without friction and with supreme confidence. IGEL and Veridium offer a true enterprise grade passwordless experience. We’re pleased that Veridium has joined our growing network of more than 100 IGEL Ready partners focused on delivering the industry’s best end user compute solutions.”

Now more than ever, providing customers and their employees with reliable, frictionless access to tools, applications, and services is critical for businesses continuity and growth. The IGEL Ready program ensures that partner applications are validated and shared, and that their customers have access to updated and secure software. This rapidly growing ecosystem of over 100 technology partners enables customers to consider compatible devices and partner applications across a range of categories in the customer-facing IGEL Ready Showcase.

To learn more and start the application process, visit igel.com/partners/technology-partners/.

To explore the IGEL Ready ecosystem of solutions, visit igel.com/ready.

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Dizzion Announces New Managed Desktop Offering on IBM Cloud to Help Enterprises Manage Their Remote Workforce

Leigh Porter — Tue, 13 Apr 2021 15:52:45 +0000

Dizzion, Inc. announced a new managed desktop offering on IBM Cloud designed to assist enterprises in managing their workforce by making it easier for employees to work remotely in a secured and collaborative environment.

Dizzion’s new managed desktops on IBM Cloud offering provides an upgraded Desktop as a Service environment for VMware Horizon on IBM Cloud users and is ideal for enterprise IT organizations looking for a long-term remote work solution that addresses performance, security and compliance challenges.

Dizzion’s new managed desktop offering on IBM Cloud has been designed to leverage VMware Horizon and other technologies to deliver applications, files, corporate network access, security and settings to an end-user’s computer from network-accessed cloud resources, as opposed to the end-user device itself. The process will offer an optimized experience for employees who work remotely and will enable access from internet-connected devices. The new offering will leverage IBM Cloud as the underlying cloud architecture, including servers, storage, networking, and security, with Dizzion as the managed cloud desktop service.

“Dizzion’s managed desktop offering for IBM Cloud can help address a high-priority IT challenge facing a wide range of organizations in 2021,” says Steve Prather, CEO at Dizzion. “Customers will receive the enterprise-level performance and protection they demand. Employees working with media-intense software from home will find their heavy applications optimized for maximum productivity. In-the-know users will have their confidential data secured when working from remote locations. Plus, with IBM Cloud as the delivery engine and VMware Horizon as the desktop virtualization platform, customers will be able to effectively respond to unexpected change.”

Dizzion customer Arise Virtual Solutions, a global customer experience outsourcing specialist, adopted Dizzion’s managed desktop offering on IBM Cloud and realized success using the solution. Arise expanded to 1,500 desktops, citing PCI-DSS compliance and strong performance levels when using customer service software as differentiators, which enabled the company to win the full outsourced customer service business from a well-known global retailer.

“The Arise® Platform is a premier provider of virtual-first customer support BPO solutions that enable brands to be there for their customers. Leveraging an expansive network of gig-economy service partners, Arise uses innovation to change the way brands think about customer care,” said Ken Braatz, Vice President of Technology Operations at Arise Virtual Solutions. “With the resulting agility, performance and compliance of the new Dizzion Managed DaaS, we proved another level of capability to our clients, which led to increased demand and corresponding expansion. Our clients and service partners depend on us to deliver the optimal customer experience solution while securing their sensitive data. With Dizzion Managed DaaS, we are able to do both.”

Dizzion is leveraging IBM’s Cloud Engagement Fund, established as part of IBM’s $1B investment into its partner ecosystem, to accelerate the company’s global expansion through access to technical resources and cloud credits that support the migration of client workloads to hybrid cloud environments, including IBM Cloud.

“By working with Hybrid Cloud Ecosystem partners like Dizzion, we can help to develop and offer new solutions that address evolving customer and partner challenges. Dizzion’s managed desktop offering for IBM Cloud is engineered to help enterprises address the need to manage more complex remote work environments,” said Willie M. Tejada, IBM Chief Developer Advocate and GM ISV/Build Ecosystem. “Supported by IBM’s Cloud Engagement Fund, Dizzion will be able to scale their offering to help expand operations to help enterprises globally.”

Dizzion’s managed desktop offering on IBM Cloud is available immediately and will replace the Horizon Cloud on IBM Cloud Service, with current customers transitioning to the new offering without having to alter their desktop images, protocols or endpoint devices. Dizzion Managed DaaS offers HIPAA, PCI-DSS, GDPR and SOC 2 Type II-compliant services with a zLink BYOD option that extends compliance to personal end-user device use cases. The offering will be available in the United States, Europe and Asia, with plans to expand globally in 2021.

Dizzion is part of IBM’s Hybrid Cloud Ecosystem, an initiative to support partners of all types — whether they build on, service or resell IBM technologies and platforms — to help clients manage and modernize workloads with Red Hat OpenShift for any cloud environment, including the IBM public cloud. The IBM public cloud is the industry’s most secure and open public cloud for business. With its security leadership, enterprise-grade capabilities and support for open source technologies, the IBM public cloud is designed to differentiate and extend on hybrid cloud capabilities for enterprise workloads.

For more information visit https://www.dizzion.com/managed-daas-on-ibm-cloud/.

VMware and VMware Horizon are registered trademarks or trademarks of VMware, Inc. in the United States and other jurisdictions.

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IGEL and Wipro collaborate as part of System Integrator Partner Program

Leigh Porter — Tue, 09 Mar 2021 19:03:54 +0000

IGEL, announced an agreement with Wipro Limited, a leading global information technology, consulting and business process services company to drive business continuity and accelerate the delivery of cloud workspaces within today’s hybrid work environments that include a mix of remote and on-premises workers. Through this new agreement, Wipro will leverage IGEL OS, alongside cloud workspace platforms from Citrix and Microsoft, as part of Wipro virtuadesk, its Desktop-as-a-Service (DaaS) solution.

“With businesses working to stay abreast of the changes in the economy brought on by COVID-19, it has become critical that they leverage cloud workspaces like VDI and DaaS in a secure way,” said Balaji Subramanian, Senior Vice President and Global Channel Chief, IGEL. “We are pleased to be adding Wipro to our growing network of system integrator partners around the globe. Teaming with them helps our mutual customers reduce costs while quickly scaling their remote work environments in a way that enhances end user productivity and security.”

Purpose-built for enterprise access to virtual and cloud-powered environments of all types, IGEL OS is ideally suited to be the edge OS for environments accessing Windows through a well-managed data center or cloud deployment. IGEL OS is also hardware-agnostic, supporting any compatible x86 endpoint so enterprises can extend the life of aging hardware while standardizing a heterogeneous desktop estate with easy-to-manage policy control and increased security. “By leveraging IGEL OS to deliver its secure cloud workspace offerings, Wipro is enabling enterprise customers to modernize and transform their endpoint computing environments,” continued Subramanian.

Wipro virtuadesk, is an appliance-based DaaS solution that provides accelerators for cloud readiness assessment, cloud migration and application life cycle management, leveraging Artificial Intelligence, Automation, Internet of Things, mobility and analytics. Wipro virtuadesk creates an ecosystem for improved employee engagement and collaboration through simpler IT.

“Today, companies must be prepared to facilitate anytime, anywhere access to systems and information for employees across business units and geographies,” said Satish Y, Vice President, Cloud & Infrastructure Services, Wipro Limited. “Technology is a key enabler of this, but it must also have a global focus. This combines the right mix of global compute and storage capabilities with more subtle elements, such as personalized and configurable services, robust service level agreements, and language capabilities to accommodate the global talent spread. IGEL is helping us deliver our re-imagined solutions, like Wipro virtuadesk, that create best-in-class virtual desktop experiences to enhance the employee experience, both in the cloud and on-premises, while helping businesses achieve their desired strategic outcomes.”

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