Citrix’s Acquisition of XenSource - Chris Wolf sounds off

Chris Wolf, Burton Group senior analyst, analyzed Citrix’s acquisition of XenSource in a recent Burton Group blog post. He sizes up the situation, saying:

“While having the technology is one thing, bringing it to market is an entirely separate issue. This is where the Citrix acquisition makes great sense for XenSource. Financially fueled by Citrix, XenSource now has the financial clout, sales, and channel resources to go after the large stake of unclaimed virtualization market share in the enterprise. Don’t get me wrong. This will not be easy, as Citrix and XenSource are competing against powerhouse vendors with strong sales, channel, and IHV partnerships. VMware, Microsoft, Red Hat, and Novell are well established in the enterprise, and are all looking to add to their share of the market. Virtual Iron has been making a lot of noise in the SMB space lately, and they should see the explosion of the XenSource sales channel as a serious threat.”

Wolf sees the acquisition as a win for Citrix and Xen and for users, too.

“In the coming months and years, we should expect to get enterprise-class virtualization technologies at lower costs, with more features, and a motivated group of vendors that are eager to push innovation to remain competitive.”

Read his blog in its entirety on the Burton Group Data Center Strategies blog.