Windows 7Customer Solution Case Study

Upgrading Desktop Operating System Reduces Image Management 25 Percent

OverviewCountry or Region: United StatesIndustry: Information technology

Customer ProfileBased in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, Citrix Systems provides virtualization and networking solutions to 230,000 customers. It employs 5,400 people.

Business SituationCitrix wanted to improve desktop deployment and management processes and offer its employees more choice in their computing devices to drive productivity and reduce costs.

SolutionCitrix migrated to Windows 7 in just three months by taking advantage of the operating system’s device compatibility and native support for desktop virtualization.

Benefits Reduced costs Avoided more than $200,000 in annual

contracting expenses Deferred hardware upgrade cost Improved productivity valued in the

millions of dollars Improved competitive edge

“Windows 7 Enterprise was the foundation for a game-changing rollout that takes advantage of client virtualization. No other Citrix initiative has achieved 90-percent compliance in three months. It’s phenomenal.”

Martin Kelly, V.P., Information Technologies, World Wide IT Service Delivery, Citrix Systems

Since 1989, Citrix Systems has developed products that help unlock applications from the data center and free employees from the office. After delaying a companywide desktop operating system upgrade for several years, Citrix was ready for a new desktop environment that would help improve employee productivity, take advantage of client hardware advances, and reduce desktop maintenance. Also, it wanted a client operating system that worked well with its own virtualization products to achieve additional efficiencies in deployment and desktop management, and showcase a leading-edge, competitive offering to customers. Citrix realized these objectives with the Windows 7 operating system from Microsoft. Today, it has reduced its desktop images from 36 to 2, cut desktop image management by 25 percent, and avoided annual contractor costs of more than two hundred thousand dollars.

Works the way you want

Works the way you want

SituationFounded in 1989, Citrix Systems has built a global business based on the promise of virtual computing. Citrix virtualization, networking, and hosted offerings simplify computing by turning information technology (IT) into an on-demand service for any employee. Today, more than 230,000 customers are using Citrix products to help them build simpler and more cost-effective IT environments, enabling virtual work styles for employees, and virtual data centers for the IT department. Based in Florida, Citrix has significant development operations in California, Massachusetts, Australia, India, and the United Kingdom.

The Citrix IT department’s vision is to enable Citrix to build, sell, deliver, and service Citrix products. In addition, the IT staff has a goal to simplify the delivery of computing as an on-demand service that enables employees to work on any device, anywhere—especially in light of the recent economic downturn. “We have had to move from a growth environment to concentrate more on efficiency,” says Martin Kelly, V.P., Information Technologies, World Wide IT Service Delivery at Citrix Systems. “We are facing the same challenges as our customers: how to help IT do more with less, while keeping increasingly sophisticated employees working productively with the hardware and software of their choice.”

Complex Desktop EnvironmentIt has been almost five years since Citrix performed a major desktop operating system migration. During this time, the company’s 5,400 employees have gradually been upgrading their hardware. Until October 2009, approximately 80 percent of

the company’s Windows-based computers ran the Windows XP Professional operating system, 10 percent ran the Windows Vista operating system, and 10 percent used Apple’s OS X Snow Leopard. “It was unfortunate that we had such a long period when employees were unable to improve their productivity by taking advantage of new capabilities in their hardware,” says Kelly.

Many employees have more than one computing device and the majority use portable computers instead of PCs. Approximately 500 employees have purchased iPads and another 500 have MacBook computers. Eleven percent of employees have opted to purchase their own computers under the company’s “Bring Your Own Computer” initiative. Under this program, staff members can choose to receive a U.S.$2,100 stipend and buy and maintain a computing device of their choice. This arrangement delivers a 15-percent reduction in the total cost of ownership per computer to Citrix, but the more important benefit to the company lies in giving the employee more autonomy over how he or she works.

“Our people care about having a choice about what equipment they use,” says Kelly. “It could be that they want a bigger laptop for gaming or for combining their personal and professional life on one machine. This is good if you are a salesperson on the road a lot. Or they might want an iPad for meetings and demos. It doesn’t matter what they use, but what does matter is how well IT can support them in their choice.”

Management Inefficiencies

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“We are facing the same challenges as our customers: how to help IT do more with less, while keeping increasingly sophisticated employees working productively with the hardware and software of their choice.”

Martin Kelly, V.P., Information Technologies, World Wide IT Service

Delivery, Citrix Systems

Citrix IT staff found it a challenge to provide regular security updates and software upgrades to a diverse desktop infrastructure and to support employees working in the company’s four global regions. “Security and desktop engineers scrambled to get patches out and staff were annoyed that they waited so long for security updates,” says Kelly. “We had to supplement our IT staff with expensive contractors to keep up with the desktop management tasks.”

Citrix maintained 36 images to accommodate multiple hardware standards and languages per geographic region. “With Windows XP, you are device-dependent, so IT becomes a bottleneck during deployment,” says Kelly. “When we rolled out Windows XP, there was a two-day or three-day turnaround for employees to get their machines back. Today at Citrix, this would be unacceptable.”

In mid-2009, Citrix found itself in a situation similar to many of its customers: facing a major desktop software upgrade with a heterogeneous desktop environment and the majority of client computers running an aging operating system. The company needed an easily deployed, powerful, and cost-effective operating system that was capable of supporting client computers in multiple form factors and offering built-in support for the company’s own virtualization products.

“We needed to drive IT efficiencies and boost employee productivity for our own benefit,” says Kelly. “But we had a second motive. We wanted to differentiate our virtualization offerings by proving that they could deliver significant savings in

deployment and desktop management costs when running in conjunction with an operating system designed to support desktop virtualization. A good migration experience internally would help us tell that story in the marketplace.”

SolutionFor these reasons, in August 2009 Citrix chose to upgrade to the Windows 7 Enterprise operating system. Even though Windows 7 wouldn’t be released until October 2009, Kelly and his colleagues found that the buzz surrounding the new operating system had already spread throughout the company.

Offering Migration Options To take advantage of this momentum, they created deployment options to help employees get the newer operating system as soon as possible. They created a website with do-it-yourself instructions and resources for employees, who could choose an IT appointment to assist with the installation or perform the migration themselves.

About 50 percent of employees took advantage of IT clinics where they dropped off their computers. Support staff took approximately 20 minutes to re-image the computers and 10 minutes to set up the drivers and migrate the employee’s files, with all user-specific settings intact. The rest, including staff at branch offices, chose a self-service method, following instructions on the website that walked them through a 30-minute process using a USB flash drive to start their computers from an image file, or .iso file.

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“We were able to migrate almost 100 percent of our users to Windows 7 between August and December 2009,” says Kelly. “We did 5,000 devices worldwide in just three months. Unlike previous migrations where the schedule was determined by the limitations of the technology, here the technology worked flawlessly in the background and we were left struggling to accommodate the demand. That’s because, for the first time, we could take advantage of a Windows operating system with built-in support for client virtualization and it worked seamlessly with our products.”

IT staff expedited the delivery of Windows 7 using a virtualized approach that combined a Windows Preinstallation Environment (Windows PE), ImageX, a tool set used to apply an image to a computer, and the Microsoft Deployment Toolkit with Citrix XenApp and Citrix XenDesktop. The XenDesktop environment provided a way to deliver Windows 7 to employees who were using thin clients, outdated hardware, or netbooks; running applications, such as Microsoft Office 2010, in a XenApp virtualized environment obviated the need for a lot of application compatibility testing.

“Application compatibility was a trivial piece of work for us because our applications are already available to users through virtualization,” says Kelly. “And thanks to the backward-compatibility mode in Windows Internet Explorer 8, any application that has already been virtual-ized with Internet Explorer 7 will work.”

Reducing the ImagesCreating images for each hardware profile had been a huge pain for Citrix IT staff. Tied to hardware profiles, the original 36 images

were cluttered with software installations, user profiles, and customizations, and layered over a global image that required language packs, an antivirus program, Citrix Receiver (to connect to XenApp and XenDesktop) and Citrix EdgeSight (to monitor workstation performance).

“Windows 7 offered a paradigm shift in image management,” says Kelly. “Because Windows 7 images do not map to hardware, we can create a single image that can be used for any Windows 7–compatible device. We have gone from 36 images to 2, and the only reason that it’s not 1 is because we had to keep a second image for Japan.”

Automating the RolloutOnce Citrix had built its two images, desktop engineers created the Windows PE image and used ImageX to modify the startup comments to automate all required preinstallation tasks. Then they applied the Citrix images, which activated a script that prompted for each employee’s location, username, and type of computer—for example, laptop, tablet, or workstation. The process finished by applying all employee customizations automatically, so that there was no change to his or her desktop experience after the upgrade. Following this process, Citrix IT staff reduced desktop imaging time from 45 minutes to 20 minutes.

“Windows 7 Enterprise was the foundation for a game-changing rollout that takes advantage of client virtualization,” says Kelly. “No other Citrix initiative has achieved 90-percent compliance in three months. It’s phenomenal. We did this in the

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"People care about having a choice about their machines, they take care of them better and we get better productivity and retention. It’s hard to quantify the value of these benefits, but it’s in the millions of dollars overall.”

Martin Kelly, V.P., Information Technologies, World Wide IT Service

Delivery, Citrix Systems

"For the first time, we could take advantage of a Windows operating system with built-in support for client virtualization and it worked seamlessly with our products.”

Martin Kelly, V.P., Information Technologies, World Wide IT Service

Delivery, Citrix Systems

fourth quarter of 2009 so it’s already in our rearview mirror. Now we can offer compelling best practices to our customers still facing the upgrade.”

BenefitsWith a global migration to Windows 7 complete, Citrix can enjoy the benefits of an operating system designed from the ground up to optimize client virtualization. “Windows PE, ImageX, Citrix XenApp, and Citrix XenDesktop were the cornerstone technologies for the rapid adoption of Windows 7. They represent a significant step forward in our efforts to simplify desktop computing,” says Kelly. “Our experience building a dynamic infrastructure with these tools has enabled us to lower the overall costs of desktop management, make headway in our vision of a new way of work, and deliver a competitive virtualization solution to the market.” Lower IT CostsAlthough the economic downturn wasn’t the real impetus behind Citrix’s migration to Windows 7, Kelly points out that the newer operating system is helping the IT department manage the desktop more efficiently and at lower cost. With only 2 corporate images to administer instead of 36, Citrix desktop engineers are saving more than 25 percent of their time. “With Windows 7, the job of desktop engineering has moved from a lot of break/fix and maintenance to focusing on more value-oriented elements such as end-user experience,” says Kelly. “As a result, desktop engineers are no longer asking the IT department for additional staff to help with daily tasks. We are avoiding costs of more than two hundred thousand dollars a year

because we don’t need four or five full-time contractors.”

IT time savings increase exponentially the more that Citrix moves employees into the virtualized computing environment. With Windows 7 working alongside Citrix virtualization products, it’s easier to achieve significant savings in desktop management. Now Citrix IT staff can provision a complete Windows 7 desktop to any employee, regardless of their location or device. That’s because IT staff can store the operating system, applications, and user profiles as separately managed entities in the data center to be assembled and delivered to employees on demand. And with one, low-cost, centrally managed Windows 7 image for most employees, IT staff only has to deploy security updates and software upgrades once and they are available to any employee.

“With Windows 7 working in concert with our virtualization products, Citrix can truly make good on its drive to achieve one corporate platform that meets everyone’s needs in terms of manageability and accessibility,” says Kelly. This approach allows Citrix to take advantage of existing hardware resources and defer the costs of a refresh program. While Citrix chose to perform a global migration, Kelly is hoping that the company’s experience can be extrapolated to customers who are unable to perform a companywide migration due to budget constraints. Migrating from a computer running Windows XP to a virtual desktop running Windows 7 gives companies an opportunity to enjoy the benefits of Windows 7 without having to upgrade everyone at the same time. They could deploy Windows 7 on new

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"Consumers believe in Windows 7. There’s a coolness factor and a productivity factor. Just as people were opting for Apple before, today they are opting for Microsoft.”

Martin Kelly, V.P., Information Technologies, World Wide IT Service

Delivery, Citrix Systems

computers used by select groups as budget allows and then use Windows 7 in concert with XenDesktop and Citrix Receiver to deliver a Windows 7 desktop to the rest of their employees on their existing computers.

Increased ProductivityCitrix believes that the best way for people to work is virtually—completely untethered from the office, devices, networks, and data centers—and that this freedom creates new possibilities for personal efficiency and business speed. The company is excited about how Windows 7 supports this vision and provides a new impetus to improve productivity.

“Windows 7 has taken us to a whole new level in our ability to experience a new way of working without being defined by location or tools,” says Kelly. “Today, I can connect to any of my devices and work when and where I want, without worrying about my files, my favorites, or my security. In the office, I’m on a thin client; at home, I’m on a laptop: and on the road, I’m on a netbook. Now my colleagues can bring up a Windows 7 desktop on the iPad and run their presentations, and if they want to also bring up an application, such as SAP, to run on Windows 7, they can do that too.” Since deploying Windows 7, Kelly has noticed a new momentum to the Bring Your Own Computer program, with more than 96 percent of participants recommending it to friends. “This is building a groundswell for the

‘consumerization’ of IT at Citrix, which drives productivity. People care about having a choice about their machines, they take care of them better and we get better productivity and retention. It’s hard to quantify the value of these benefits, but it’s in the millions of dollars overall.”

Improved Competitive EdgeToday, Citrix sales representatives are carrying laptops, iPads, and handheld devices running the Android operating system when they are on the road. They turn on their devices and bring up a Windows 7 desktop using Citrix virtualization technologies to tell a compelling story to customers.

“Credibility-wise, it’s huge for us to run customer presentations on any device using Windows 7 streamed from a data center in Miami—all for significantly less cost,” says Kelly. “It helps that many customers’ employees now have Windows 7 at home. Consumers believe in Windows 7. There’s a coolness factor and a productivity factor. Just as people were opting for Apple before, today they are opting for Microsoft.”

Windows 7Faster and more reliable: Window 7 will help your organization use information technology to gain a competitive advantage in today’s new world of work. Your people will be able to be more productive anyway. You will be able to support your mobile work force with better

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For More InformationFor more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers in the United States and Canada who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to:www.microsoft.com

For more information about Citrix Systems products and services, call (800) 424-8749 or visit the Web site at: www.citrix.com

This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.

Document published September 2010

Software and Services Windows 7 Enterprise Technologies− ImageX− Windows Preinstallation Environment

Hardware Desktop: HP Compaq 6000 Pro; Dell

Precision T3500 Portable Computer: Dell Latitude E6410;

Lenovo ThinkPad T410

access to shared data and collaboration tools. And your IT staff will have better tools and technologies to enhance corporate IT security, data protection, and more efficient deployment and management.

For more information about Windows 7, go to:www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7

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