Is It Virtual Or Real?
Theresa Lanowitz | August 17, 2007
The big news today was the Citrix acquisition of open source virtualization company XenSource. I have commented many times in the past year about the future I think virtualization has and how it will be one of the defining technologies of the 21st century.

So, here is my philosophy on the acquisition….one if you are inclined to be a geek and another if you fancy yourself more of a business person. Either way, the net / net of this is virtualization is real and coming to an enterprise near you.

Citrix Acquisition of XenSource for Geeks
Citrix’ acquisition of XenSource to more effectively compete with VMware is a positive move for the market. This acquisition shows that the criticality of the virtualization market is understood and enterprises are focused on using the technology in multiple aspects of their business.

Virtualization delivers a malleable environment unconstrained by barriers. VMware has been diligent at delivering virtualization to the entire enterprise. The messages put forth by VMware accelerated the visibility and acceptance of the market. Microsoft has publicly stated they will deliver on virtualization in the presentation layer, server, desktop and the application. However, Microsoft’s timeline is somewhat delayed.

In addition to larger vendors such as VMware and Microsoft touting solutions for virtualization there are also smaller vendors with more specific solutions, especially in the area of the application lifecycle. Vendors such as Surgient and VMLogix have solutions focused on virtual lab management that go directly to the issues of time-to-market and resource utilization for enterprise development and quality assurance groups.

Citrix Acquisition of XenSource for the Business Minded
The recent activity and interest around virtualization including the VMware IPO and Cirtix acquisition of XenSource is indicative of the importance of virtualization as the leading technology of the 21st century.

In a week where the market was headed decidedly south, the VMware IPO emerged as a star. The timing of the Citrix acquisition of XenSource was impeccable. XenSource is an open source company specializing in hypervisors, technology that allows multiple operating systems to simultaneously run on a single host computer. These two events showcase enterprise interest in virtualization.

What does this really mean? It means the way Microsoft has shaped the market with the operating system, Windows, as the building block is about to undergo a transformation. The transformation means that technology can be built to run on any device, duplicated elsewhere and keep track of where and how it is running.

Think about the possibilities this can create. Software will not be tied to an operating system, rather it will be a malleable environment capable of running where the user wants it to.

Stay tuned….there should be more to come in this epic at VMware’s VMworld conference in September.
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