Citrix and NetApp Collaborate to Simplify Enterprise Cloud

At Citrix Synergy, Citrix Systems, Inc. and NetApp Inc. announced an extension of their current collaboration aimed at accelerating the adoption of enterprise cloud deployments.

Together, Citrix and NetApp will provide an integrated cloud orchestration and storage solution that will address storage automation, resource allocation, and virtual machine backup and recovery. The move simplifies cloud storage deployment for the companies’ mutual customers and will result in faster transitions to private and hybrid clouds.

Over the past few years, cloud computing has evolved from a simple public compute utility model that addressed the needs of individual developers to one that has fundamentally shifted how enterprises deliver, manage, and consume IT services throughout their organizations.

Today, product integrations with NetApp storage enable Citrix CloudPlatform to discover and incorporate NetApp storage as primary and secondary storage. Moving forward, collaboration between the two companies will build on this existing success with a focus on combining NetApp unified storage solutions and Data ONTAP with both Citrix CloudPlatform and the Apache CloudStack project, providing users with a cloud-ready storage environment that will optimize storage utilization, simplify maintenance, and accelerate the transition to an agile data infrastructure.

These integrations between Citrix and NetApp technology
will focus on the following capabilities:

• NetApp OnCommand Unified Manager. Support in Citrix CloudPlatform and Apache CloudStack will automate the provisioning and administration of storage service offerings within the product’s self-service portal, increasing agility while decreasing service deployment times based on policy-based resource allocation.
• NetApp virtual storage console (VSC) for XenServer. NetApp plug-in for XenCenter empowers Citrix administrators to provision, deduplicate, resize, and delete storage repositories on NetApp storage. In VDI deployments, NetApp VSC for Citrix XenServer allows for cloning tens of thousands of VMs almost instantaneously with NetApp FlexClone technology.

Jürgen Heinrich, MD, Kommunale Informationsverarbeitung Baden-Franken (KIVBF), said: "As an IT services provider for more than 600 cities and counties in southwestern Germany, we are transforming the way local governments provide services to citizens by working with Citrix and its partners to develop ‘trusted cloud,’ an award-winning cloud solution for the public sector. Using Citrix cloud solutions to build a standardized cloud architecture and self-service portal, we made it simple to provision desktops and applications using the cloud to 40,000 public sector users literally ‘out of the socket.’ We also implemented NetApp storage into our solution architecture due to its storage power, ease of integration, and interoperability with Citrix solutions."

Cyrano Rizzo, manager of IT Infrastructure, University of São Paulo, said: "As the largest public university in Brazil, USP attracts students and researchers worldwide. The university decided moving to the cloud was the best decision to rein in disparate data centers, reduce redundancy, centralize data and applications, and provide users with self-service access. Because of their proven integration, the university selected Citrix CloudPlatform as the foundation for CloudUSP and NetApp for both primary and secondary storage."

Sameer Dholokia, VP and GM, Cloud Platforms Group, Citrix, said: "NetApp supporting Cloud Platform powered by Apache CloudStack is an excellent proof point that this open source software project is offering customers the collaborative-based process they need. We are excited to learn that NetApp will integrate its storage solutions with Apache CloudStack and Citrix CloudPlatform, and we look forward to the opportunities this will offer our joint customers."

Patrick Rogers, VP, Data Center Platforms, NetApp, said: "The Citrix Cloud Platform powered by Apache CloudStack provides our mutual enterprise customers worldwide with a simple, easy-to-deploy architecture for transitioning from current IT infrastructure silos to private and hybrid clouds. The platform continues to gain momentum, and NetApp looks forward to working with Citrix on integration work that helps accelerate the transition to a shared, agile data infrastructure."