Citrix launches the Workspace Cloud on the last day of its Citrix Summit, Las Vegas-- technically a rebrand of another product, specifically Workspace Services, first revealed at the 2014 Synergy conference.
According to Citrix CEO Mark Templeton Workspace Cloud "represents probably a five-year journey. It is the future, how we will work together, how we will make the software available."
As the company puts it, Workspace Cloud is a scaleable services management platform. It automates the creation and delivery of secure mobile workspaces (thus the name) complete with desktops, apps and data, on any public cloud (including AWS, Microsoft Azure, IBM SoftLayer and the Cisco cloud) or hypervisor running on on-premises or hybrid clouds. As a result customers can choose from a variety of workspace and infrastructure options, or simply use the Citrix platform to build own infrastructure.
The Workspace Cloud also includes cloud builder tools via Lifecycle Management service and Edge Service, a feature allowing admins to manage a local active directory before accessing cloud resources.
Another relevant Citrix Summit announcement involves a new channel program-- the Citrix Solution Advisor (CSA) program offering the company's 9000 partners simplified certification, adjusted revenue requirements and new benefits and incentives. It is the "central pillar" of a new Citrix Partner Growth Plan, together with three other pillars of field and partner collaboration, focused partner enablement and "robust" demand generation via multi-touch marketing campaigns.
The Workspace Cloud launches later in 2015, while the CSA program is already open, with the other pillars to follow.
