Virtualization and Cloud executives share their predictions for 2017.  Read them in this 9th annual VMblog.com series exclusive.

Contributed by Emanuel Pirker, CEO of Stratodesk

2017 Predictions: Why VDI Partners Will Be Smiling

Larger companies are making bigger VDI deployments. In the past, companies experimented with proof-of-concept testing on a few hundred clients. Now, there's more evidence of the value of VDI, and we're seeing larger companies repurpose as many as 7,000 PCs as VDI clients in as little as a weekend.

A greater percentage of companies are choosing to repurpose PCs for faster ROI. A VDI project cuts operational expenses, but it is capital intensive to launch. Awareness is spreading that companies can trim 40 percent off capital outlays by repurposing existing PCs instead of buying thin clients. Companies use the savings to make investments such as beefing up their VDI servers to maximize the performance of virtual desktops.

As deployments grow, it's even more important to have flexible, centralized management. More companies are aware that a VDI client management tool needs to meet requirements such as these:

• Is it vendor-agnostic? Will it support most types of thin clients and repurposed PCs and laptops, or does it come from a technology vendor that wants to lock customers in to only certain types of PCs and thin clients?
  

• Does it enable a client to support dual monitors, or just a standard VGA connection?
  

• Does it replace vulnerable Windows operating systems on endpoints with an encrypted Linux-based OS? Does its provider offer timely updates for security?
  

• Will it support popular single sign-on and smart card solutions from vendors such as Imprivata? Can it meet healthcare, financial services, and government standards for two-factor authentication, including standards from the Department of Defense?
  

Desktop as a Service (DaaS) growth is accelerating. As users gain greater trust in the cloud, DaaS service providers are expanding quickly, and discovering that PC repurposing software is a fast, cost-efficient way to build a bridge from local hardware to a rented desktop in the cloud.

Because of factors like these, 2017 should see strong growth in the VDI market.

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About the Author

Emanuel Pirker is CEO of Stratodesk, the maker of NoTouch software, which repurposes existing PCs and laptops in just seconds to become "zero-like" virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) clients.