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Microsoft And Citrix To Create WAN Optimisation Appliance Together

Wednesday, 23 August 2006 by Michel Roth

It seems like the there's no hard feelings between (these departments of) Microsoft and Citrix. In a press release they've announced that they will be working together in creating an appliance in which they will be combining Windows Server 2003 R2 and ISA Server together with Citrix' WANScaler WAN optimisation functionality.

"The upcoming box, slated to ship in the second half of 2007, will combine Windows Server 2003 R2 and ISA server from Microsoft with WANScaler WAN optimization software. Citrix acquired WANScaler in its just-completed buyout of Orbital Data, said Wes Wasson, vice president of Citrix' Application Networking Group.

That appliance will knit together security, caching, data compression, remote print and file management, security from its component parts. Built with common hardware, the appliance will be branded and sold by Citrix and its partners, said Wasson and Bala Kasiviswanathan, Microsoft group product manager for Windows Server Branch and Storage Solutions.

Pricing was not disclosed, but Wasson said the companies would likely come up with a family of products targeting branch offices of different sizes.

The goal of the product is to be easy to plug in and run remotely. There is a large pool of partners with both Citrix and Microsoft expertise who could use this to enter branch office businesses and remotely manage them. Many of these offices are severely IT constrained, many with no IT staff at all, both executives said.

There are a raft of appliances from Riverbed Technology, Silverpeak and others, many running Linux. The Citrix and Microsoft executives said this upcoming box combines infrastructural capabilities not offered in those solutions."

Read more here or read the press release here.