Contributed article by Dan Cordingley, CEO of Teradici

2014 - The Year of DaaS, and VDI acceleration

The shift towards the cloud and mobile - and the inevitable trend of BYOD - is putting pressure on IT managers, on top of tighter budgets and fluctuating headcounts. In 2014, more organizations will begin to explore alternatives to traditional enterprise computing models, particularly as Desktop-as-a-Service (DaaS) and Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) gain traction in the marketplace.

The rise of Desktop as a Service

In late October, virtualization guru Gabe Knuth asserted that 2014 will be the year of DaaS, citing VMware's acquisition of leading DaaS software provider and Teradici partner, Desktone, as the "ultimate validation" of the category. Less than two weeks later, Amazon Web Services announced plans for a PCoIP DaaS solution, Amazon WorkSpaces, at AWS re:Invent in November, where  Andy Jassy, Senior Vice President of Amazon Web Services and Amazon Infrastructure, cited DaaS as its most requested service.

As enterprise computing moves into the cloud, delivery of desktops via PCoIP is a natural extension for today's IT organizations, with the potential to dramatically reduce costs, simplify management and improve security.  Many companies love VDI and the benefits it brings, such as enabling BYOD, security and mobility.  Others are less enthusiastic about the set up and management required. So, we tend to agree with Gabe, 2014 will indeed be the year of DaaS and expect other players to enter the market.

Accelerated growth in Virtual Desktops

The emergence of DaaS will have a positive impact on traditional VDI, leading to accelerated growth in the category. As more companies consider DaaS, many will also re-evaluate VDI. The decreasing costs to deploy a VDI or DaaS solution will make virtual desktops more accessible to SMBs and open up opportunities in new markets, increasing the total addressable market for vendors and partners, worldwide. We're already seeing significant movement outside of traditional VDI verticals, such as financial services and government, and large-scale deployments in education, healthcare, manufacturing and retail sectors, among others.

Perceptions of VDI will catch up with reality

In the past, VDI had its fair share of issues, leading to skepticism and disillusionment. Today, VDI technology is easier than ever to implement. Vendors have heavily invested to simplify implementation, reduce costs, and deliver an uncompromised user experience. Despite the naysayers, momentum and adoption appears to be accelerating for VDI. We anticipate this trend will continue in 2014.

The SaaSification of Apps

As more of the desktop experience shifts to the cloud, we predict applications will go in a similar direction. Apps will be hosted in the cloud and delivered to any device. This shift from local apps to cloud apps will not only improve data security, but could also improve the user experience.

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About the Author

Dan brings to Teradici 20 years of experience in the semiconductor industry, having started several new business initiatives and managed their successful growth. Prior to co-founding Teradici, Dan was a General Manager with Intel Corporation, where he oversaw the Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) silicon business unit, a group with leading market share in key segments of the highly competitive DSL chipset industry. Before Intel, Dan was a General Manager and Director at Level One Communications, a leading supplier of networking and telecom semiconductors that was acquired by Intel in 1999 for US $2.2B. Under Dan's leadership, Level One conceived, standardized, and delivered several important communications standards in widespread use today. Dan has also held senior marketing and design engineering roles at Mitel Semiconductor (now Zarlink), Spectrum Signal Processing, Nortel Networks and IBM.

Dan holds a Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Waterloo, and an MBA from the Ivey School of Business at the University of Western Ontario.