Citrix Systems, Inc. today announced Citrix Branch Repeater VPX, the WAN optimization virtual appliance that provides a high definition desktop and application experience to thousands of branch offices worldwide, and Citrix Access Gateway VPX, the secure access virtual appliance that provides safe application access to users from anywhere. With these new products, Citrix is changing the industry landscape by extending the benefits of server and desktop virtualization to virtual network services running at both the datacenter and the branch office. The two new virtual appliances join Citrix NetScaler VPX, the industry-leading application acceleration and load-balancing virtual appliance, (see “Citrix Delivers NetScaler VPX Virtual Appliance and Unveils Citrix Ready Open Networking Program”), Together, these virtual networking solutions accelerate and secure virtual desktops and applications from thousands of enterprise datacenters and cloud providers to users anywhere, on-demand, anytime. By combining all the benefits of hardware network appliances with the simplicity, flexibility and cost-effectiveness of software appliances, Citrix now offers the industry’s only complete end-to-end networking system.

 

The Citrix VPX solution represents the company’s leadership in creating a fundamentally different approach to the growing convergence of virtualization and networking technologies in the modern datacenter and emerging cloud architectures. By offering open, flexible solutions that work with the technology customers have already invested in, Citrix allows them to extend the value of their existing investments in the network and branch offices in ways they never thought possible before. With physical network appliances, IT organizations grapple with inefficient procurement, trial and deployment cycles while increasing the complexity associated with hardware proliferation and management. IT loses agility in the branch office due to infrastructure availability problems, resulting in high cost and delays of new branch office setup. Citrix virtual network appliances help transform the economics and agility of IT services by leveraging industry-standard server hardware and virtualization in the network infrastructure. By simplifying and expediting procurement, trials, and deployment for enterprises, Citrix improves availability of desktops and applications, and enables dynamic provisioning to meet varying user demand. By virtualizing the branch and network infrastructure, organizations can simplify and lower the TCO of network infrastructure in branch offices as well as in datacenters.

“Server virtualization is enabling a new level of branch office service consolidation,” says Joe Skorupa, Research VP Networking and Communications Data Center, Gartner. “WAN Optimization Controller vendors are responding to this new opportunity by developing a variety of approaches that can reduce capital expenditure and operating expenditure for branch office IT services. As the requirement for additional services in the "serverless" branch expands, virtualization is key to avoiding box proliferation.” (*Gartner, Virtualization Enables Rich Choices for Branch Office Boxes, November 6, 2009)

Network virtualization also improves the economics of cloud computing by providing a flexible and cost-effective deployment model for delivering customized network services. Virtualized network appliances simplify the complexity and challenges of supporting and managing multi-tenant cloud environments. The Citrix end-to-end virtualization networking solution enables cloud service providers to offer value-added services, such as application acceleration, secure access and WAN optimization on a per-tenant basis. Cloud service providers can leverage Citrix Service Provider subscription pricing to offer on-demand network services to their customers, eliminating large, up-front capital expenditures and enhancing the elasticity and profitability of service offerings.

“With the introduction of Branch Repeater and Access Gateway as virtual appliances, we are bringing together the company’s expertise in both networking and server/desktop virtualization to deliver the industry’s only complete end-to-end application networking virtualization solution,” said Troy Trenchard, group vice president and general manager of the Security and Acceleration Product Group at Citrix.

By virtualizing the foundational network services and deploying the Citrix VPX solution on any off-the-shelf hardware, enterprises can now realize reduced bandwidth costs, simplified branch infrastructure, faster performance and better security. Specific benefits include:

• Flexible Deployment - The Citrix VPX solution enables flexible datacenter and branch deployment options requiring minimum changes to the underlying network infrastructure.
• Lower TCO for Hardware - The Citrix VPX solution provides significant cost savings from hardware standardization, lower energy consumption and faster new branch office setup.
• On-Demand Provisioning - The Citrix VPX solution increases agility, scalability, performance and availability with on-demand provisioning and de-provisioning of virtual network appliances.
• Flexible and Affordable Pricing Model - The Citrix VPX solution provides flexible Pay-As-You-Grow pricing models, allowing service providers and enterprises to offer security and acceleration services based on demand.

Availability

Citrix Access Gateway VPX is available today and Citrix Branch Repeater VPX will be released later this month. Both will be available from Citrix Solution Advisors worldwide. Later in 2010, Access Gateway VPX Express and Branch Repeater VPX Express will also be available for free download from http://www.citrix.com/downloads.