Quoting from Akimbi's official press release:

Akimbi Systems, the global leader in Virtual Lab Automation software, today announced that it will bundle Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2 at no extra cost for organizations that choose to deploy Akimbi Slingshot on Microsoft's virtual infrastructure technology. The bundle will be available within 14 days. Earlier today, Microsoft announced that it is now offering Virtual Server 2005 R2 as a no-charge download (for more, see http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/default.mspx).

"Microsoft has been a strong supporter of Akimbi Systems from our inception. Since our launch in September 2005, Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 has been included in our downloadable evaluation software package, enabling customers to experience the benefits of Virtual Lab Automation even if they were not previously using virtualization technology," said James Phillips, CEO of Akimbi Systems. "Customers who purchase Akimbi Slingshot have the option to keep the Virtual Server 2005 R2 licenses used in their evaluation free of charge, ensuring a seamless transition from evaluation to production use of the system, and gaining a cost-effective virtualization solution that spans today's virtual machine technology to tomorrow's Windows hypervisor-based technology."

In addition to bundling Virtual Server 2005 R2 in its evaluation software, Akimbi will continue to offer an Akimbi Slingshot plus Virtual Server 2005 R2 bundle for those customers who wish to simplify their purchase and enjoy a complete out-of-the-box experience. Leading Global 2000 businesses, including RSA Security and Juniper Networks, have deployed Akimbi Slingshot on Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 to increase their return on investment in test lab capital equipment, accelerate the development and enhancement of enterprise applications, and improve the quality and availability of business-critical software systems.

"Customer acceptance of Akimbi Slingshot represents compelling evidence of the IT efficiency and process improvements made possible by data center virtualization technology," said Jim Ni, group product manager, Windows Server Division at Microsoft Corp. "Virtualization technology, such as Microsoft Virtual Server and Akimbi Slingshot, is helping customers break down traditional infrastructure boundaries, improve resource utilization and progress toward self-managing dynamic systems. Akimbi is a strong virtualization partner and they're providing mutual customers with a cost-effective solution for today's and tomorrow's virtualization environments."

Akimbi Systems' flagship product, the Akimbi Slingshot Virtual Lab Automation System, leverages virtual machine technology from companies such as Microsoft and VMware to help enterprise application development teams, and the IT operations groups that support them, address a number of critical challenges, including:

--  controlling test lab server, storage and network equipment sprawl;
--  minimizing the overhead of manual, time-consuming test setup and
    provisioning; and
--  eliminating the cost of system failures due to latent defects in
    software systems.
    

Akimbi Slingshot automates the rapid setup, capture and teardown of any number of complex software configurations, and makes them available to users on a self-service basis, saving time and accelerating application development processes. With Akimbi Slingshot, organizations can pool and share servers, storage and network equipment, lowering the "server-to-staff ratio" and reducing capital expenditures.