The Aliens Have Landed – AppSense on Virtual-Strategy.com

Only yesterday I blogged about Martin Ingram being a published author on ComputerWorld and Enterprise System Journal.  Well, lets now add Virtual Strategy Magazine in to the mix.  It would appear I missed off his article ‘The Aliens Have Landed’ – and how is that possible when considering the article header picture?! ;)

Besides looking like a mild-mannered version of the Incredible Hulk, Martin goes on to compare how the deployments of some of the larger virtual desktop implementations holds similarities to the arrival of aliens – will any new technology really help? and how that we can not fully understand appreciate the capabilities, and at the same time the limitations until we thoroughly use the new technology in real world environments.  Secondly how the spread in adoption of desktop virtualization can be compared to the patterns the aliens made as they moved across our planet in the 1953 film ‘War of the Worlds.

The article can be found in full here

Thanks

Gaz

AppSense invited to blog on leading industry news websites

Martin Ingram, VP of Strategy at AppSense has been busy – briefing Analysts, Press, working with vendor partners such as Microsoft, Citrix and VMware, and most recently, publishing a series of articles on highly respected sites such as ComputerWorld and Enterprise System Journal.

The invitations to become a featured author on these popular sites is a clear validation as to Martins leadership and forward thinking thoughts on desktop virtualization – and luckily for us at AppSense, feeding these visions into our product development roadmap.

His articles can be found below:

ComputerWorld – The Why’s and Wherefores of Virtualization
Here, Martin looks back at where virtualization has come from, what it has achieved, and  makes sense of the rapid innovation in this space – helping you navigate and review the hows, whys and wherefores of virtualization.
Article can be found here.

Enterprise System Journal – Client Virtualization: The Next Frontier
As virtualization moves quickly from the data center to the client device, Martin examines the benefits of hosted desktop virtualization, and how this will impact laptop and client side management via client virtualization.
Article can be found here.

Thanks

Gaz

AppSense part of the Microsoft SAM Partner Program

I previously blogged about Microsoft Application Device License Control in SBC, VDI and Streamed Environments, where I highlighted that Microsoft Applications are in fact licensed on a PER DEVICE basis, and not, a PER USER basis – which may cause issues for many organizations in terms of licensing where by only a certain number of USERS needs access (and therefore perceivable a small number of user licenses) but in order to comply with Microsoft Licensing you must still have a license for EVERY DEVICE in the organization, even if the users of those devices will never run the application in question.

Further to this AppSense are recognized by Microsoft as a valid means to control application access at a DEVICE level and are therefore able to reduce device based license requirements.

I am pleased to announce that AppSense, in addition to being a Microsoft Gold ISV Partner, the Microsoft System Center Alliance Program and member of the Microsoft High Potential Managed Partner Program, are now also listed as a Microsoft SAM (Software Asset Management) Partner and listed exclusively as a SAM related tool and service on the Microsoft SAM Partner web-page

Quoting the page:

“Today’s IT organizations are constantly striving to lower the total cost of ownership of their infrastructure while getting the maximum value from their IT investment. With the onset of multiple delivery technologies, efficient software license management is a key component of today’s IT strategy. Microsoft acknowledge AppSense Application Manager as a solution that enterprises could use as part of Software Asset Management to provide device-based license management in a Windows® Terminal Services, virtual desktop or virtualized streamed environment.”
Sam Bramwell
Licensing, Anti-Piracy and SAM Audience Marketing Manager, Microsoft Limited

 

To learn more about Microsoft Licensing and how AppSense Application Manager can be used to not only ensure compliance, but also reduce the amount of device licenses required, saving operational costs and providing almost immediate return on investment, please visit our solutions page here

 

A copy of the Official Microsoft approved whitepaper on use of AppSense for application access and license control in virtual environments can be found here

 

Thanks

Gaz

AppSense named ‘Citrix Ready Solution of the Year’ Finalist

As I’m sure many of you are aware, Citrix work proactively with their partners to develop a strong ecosystem of vendors and resellers so together, we offer solutions with services rather than unsupported products.  Definitely a winning formula for everyone involved, including our joint end user customers.

The ‘Citrix Ready’ program creates a structure for all the great activities and collaboration.  AppSense are a founding member of the Citrix Ready program,  and today there are now over 350 partners, one of which will receive  the ‘Citrix Ready Solution of the Year’ award, based on core criteria which underpins what it means do be a good partner to Citrix – What’s the impact of Citrix’s business?  How committed is the partner to the Citrix relationship, joint marketing and channel/field collaboration?  And of course most important of all – how satisfied are the joint customers?

I’m delighted to announce that AppSense have been shortlisted as finalists alongside HP, NetApp, Wyse, RES and SMS Passcode.  Vicky Pomarico, Senior Manager of the Citrix Ready program has written a short blog on the finalists on the Citrix Community Blog here 

Citrix will be posting blogs about each partner solution over the coming days, the AppSense specific article (along with great feedback and supportive comments from our Partners and Customers) can be found here.

AppSense also issued a supporting press release, with a very positive quote from John Danelle, VP of Solutions and Community Marketing at Citrix,
“The Citrix and AppSense partnership has enabled customers to obtain the highest quality user and desktop experience today.  AppSense is a strong supporter of the Citrix Ready program and has fully leveraged the program to their benefit,” said John Fanelli, vice president of solutions and community marketing at Citrix. “Congratulations on your nomination.”

A full copy of the press release can be found here

The results will be announced in May at Citrix Synergy, San Francisco. 

We look forward to seeing you there!

Thanks

AppSense Joins the Microsoft System Center Alliance

AppSense are pleased to announce that we have been selected to become a member of the Microsoft System Center Alliance.

Together Microsoft and AppSense solutions empower over 4,500 customers to easily manage all aspects of the user experience, increasing user productivity and dramatically decreasing operational costs.

Microsoft issued the following quote:

“We welcome AppSense to the System Center Alliance as they bring new efficiencies to customers interested in simplifying the management of their IT environments,” said JD Marymee, director of strategic partner alliances, Management and Services Division, Microsoft. “We look forward to strengthening our collaboration with AppSense as they continue to demonstrate their expertise in providing customer satisfaction with Microsoft products and technology.”

In addition to AppSense, other System Center Alliance Members (and close AppSense partners)  include; Citrix, Dell, Fujitsu and HP

A full copy of the Press Release can be found here

Thanks

Gaz

AppSense Drive Further US Expansion With New COO

Off the back of a record-breaking 2009, seeing AppSense sell over 1 million licenses of our leading user virtualization software, with almost 200k of those licenses being specifically for VDI environments (full write up here) – I am pleased to announce further US success and expansion in the form of Darron Antill joining AppSense as Chief Operating Officer.

Darron brings 20 years of success to AppSense, where he will continue to drive record revenue growth and further strengthen our alliances with partners such as Citrix, Microsoft, VMware, CSC, IBM, Dell, Fujitsu, HP to name a few.

Further to Darron, AppSense recently relocated several of our UK VP’s to the US:

Pete Rawlinson, VP of Marketing now resides in our Manhattan, NY, Head Office
Simon Rust, VP of Technology is now in our Palo Alto, CA, Technology Center
Martin Ingram, VP of Strategy is also based in the Palo Alto Technology Center
Along with Simon Clephan, VP of Alliances who is also based in Palo Alto

A short while back, Simon Bramfitt published a piece on AppSense presence in the San Francisco Bay area which can be found here

Please join me in welcoming Darron - I look forward to even greater 2010..

A full copy of the official Press Release on this can be found here

Thanks

Gaz

AppSense Attend Citrix Partner Exchange & Solutions Seminar – Post Event Review

AppSense recently attended the Citrix Partner Exchange and Solutions Seminar in Holland.  The Citrix Partner Exchange and Solutions Seminar bring together Citrix resellers, end users, prospects and supporting vendors.  The event was a huge success, almost doubling last year’s attendance with a room busting 1,100 attendees this year – really goes to show Citrix virtualization technology is taking the world by storm.

The joint Citrix & AppSense resellers, joint customers and new end users created an interesting dynamic, with resellers bring their clients to Citrix technology stands/sessions and to the supporting vendor booths where there were three and four way conversations between end user, reseller partner, supporting vendor and Citrix on how to enable the adoption of Citrix XenDesktop and XenApp delivery technologies.

What was very interesting about this event from a leading supporting vendor’s point of view was that AppSense were invited to attend as the only User Virtualization (aka Environment/Workspace) Management Solution provider – something we are very proud of and goes to show our close committed relationship. (A list of partners can be found here, on the Citrix Partner Exchange and Solutions Seminar website )

During the event we also had some great meetings with Citrix, so please do expect to see a lot more joint activities in the BeNeLux region over the coming months…

Thanks to all who made the event a great success, look forward to seeing you all at the next one!

More information can be found on the Citrix Partner Exchange and Solution Seminar Website – http://www.citrixsolutionsseminar.com/

Thanks

Gaz

Citrix Tech Talk Webinar – User Profiles for XenApp and/or XenDesktop

As part of the Tech Talk and Ask The Experts series, Citrix recently host a webinar covering User Profile Management challenges, considerations and best practices in a Citrix XenApp and/or XenDesktop environment.

The webinar was presented by Jo Harder, a Senior Architect in the Citrix Technical Readiness Team – and covered:
   -  The Logon Process
   -  User Profile Characteristics
   -  GPO’s
   -  Folder Redirection
   -  Which User Profile Type Should I User? – (Mandatory, Roaming, Citrix Streamed, or 3^rd Party AppSense)
   -  Sample Scenarios – (What are the limitation of certain profile types and what is and is not supported – e.g. V1 to V2 profile types, across delivery mechanism, cross 32/64bit platforms etc..)

This is a very useful webinar and clearly details what is the best, or only supported method of user profile/personalization management in various end user scenarios.  I am pleased to say as the leading User Virtualization Solution, AppSense were included as part of this session and were recommended in many cases where Roaming and Citrix Streamed Profiles are unsuitable and not supported.

Jo has kindly posted the webinar on Citrix TV and can be watched again here

A copy of the PPT slides have been uploaded to Citrix.com can also be downloaded here

Furthermore, based on Jo’s expert knowledge and end user experience, she has also published a whitepaper on Profile Management which can be downloaded from the Citrix Support site here

I urge you to please take a look at any of the above resources if you are currently experiencing user profile issues, or, plan to use a combination of Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop as it may be that Citrix do not support User Profile Manager in such cases, and as such recommend a 3^rd party solution such as AppSense as per the webinar…

For further information on how AppSense and other leading Citrix recommended partner solutions compliment and enable the adoption of Citrix Technology , please visit the Citrix Featured Partner Page here

I will keep you posted on other future Tech Talk webinars in the series..

Many thanks

Gaz

(I have attached a couple of the slides from the PPT deck below as images, clicking on any of them will take you to the PPT deck on Citrix.com)

AppSense ‘In the Media’

As desktop virtualization continues to gather momentum, so does the amount of information being made available to us.   What is becoming very apparent, is the amount of focus on what is considered to be the third layer of the desktop – the User (after the operating system and application set).  Just like the OS and App’s are virtualized, for successful adoption of desktop virtualization, the user must also be virtualization and decoupled from the OS and App’s.

Just this week alone, I have seen 3 separate blogs focusing on the AppSense, who provide user virtualization solutions to enterprise organizations:

Above the Cloud – User Virtualization, by Steven Nagy 
Steven focuses on cloud based technologies, and recently spent some time speaking with Martin Ingram, VP of Strategy at AppSense and since published a blog detailing on the importance of user virtualization and how it is crucial to cloud based desktop and application delivery.
His blog can be found here

SearchVirtualDesktop.com / TechTarget - Keeping the turf wars at bay, by Bridget Botelho
Further to the 451 report focusing detailing why Cox Communications needed AppSense user virtualization over profile management to roll-out VMware View, SearchVirtualDesktop spoke to Cox Comms as part of an article focusing on some of the changes to how an IT Department operates when moving to a virtual desktop environment.
The article can be found here

TechDay – AppSense: More growth to come from New Zealand, by Gavin Ogden
Sean Walsh, GM of AppSense ANZ was interviewed and discusses how he has built up a strong AppSense market in Australia, and that Asia is really starting to take-off, however he see’s an up-lift in growth in our New Zealand market as desktop virtualization continues to be adopted.
The article can be found here

You can keep up to date with other AppSense mentions in the media via the AppSense news pages – http://www.appsense.com/thecompany/news.aspx 

Thanks
Gaz

AppSense Webinar Series

Due to popular demand from some of the sales guys here and also from many of our partners, I am pleased to announce the arrival of  the ‘AppSense Webinar Series’.  The webinar series is open to everyone, and will provide information on various aspect of User Virtualization, and how best to manage the user environment of the desktop stack.

Topics include:

Introduction to User Virtualization – presented by Peter Rawlinson, VP WW Marketing

Desktop Virtualization from Citrix, Microsoft and AppSense – presented by myself (Gareth Kitson, Snr Product Marketing Manager)

Assessing the benefits of AppSense in your Citrix XenDesktop environment – presented by Dave Shepherd, Head of Pre-Sales Northern Europe

Simplifying Windows 7 migration – presented by Bas Bremmer, Senior Pre-Sales Consultant BeNeLux

Further information on the above sessions, including time, dates and the option to register your attendance can be found on the new AppSense Webinar Series web-pages over at http://www.AppSense.com/Webinars

Please do visit that site often, as we will be updating it regularly with new webinars frequently.

Speaking of webinars:
1.  Please remember that Jo Harder, Senior Architect at Citrix Systems is hosting what promises to be a very useful and informative webinar on user profile management in Citrix XenApp & XenDesktop environments – if you have already registered, you can do so at https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/578175001 

2.  The AppSense & Citrix Proof of Concept kit webinar for the Citrix reseller channel - more information on the joint webinar, along with  registration details can be found on the Citrix Channel Training website here – http://www.citrixchanneltraining.com/?pg=ev&id=384&sid=0

Many Thanks

Gaz