Quest’s Vision of the New User Workspace

We are living in one of the most unprecedented and exciting times in technology. Shayne Higdon, VP of the Quest User Workspace Management BU explains why and how Quest is in a unique position to help customer be successful in this ‘age’.

A time when we will look back, much like we look back on the creation and impact that BASIC, DOS, the Intel processor, the Apple II/IIe, Windows, the Internet, iPhone / iPad, Amazon, Google and Facebook, and we will be in awe at what new business models, technologies, applications and services have been created and which ones no longer exist.  Change, change, and more change, it has marked a technological era.  No, I'm not talking about money, but rather the act of making something different.

You've heard the saying 'change is the only constant.'  Change is a fact of life in all respects, and it is definitely true in technology where everything is in a constant state of change, discovery, invention, and reinvention. There are significant changes happening right before our eyes as companies and organizations struggle to get their arms around the changes occurring in the traditional desktop market.  The traditional, physical desktop is now being delivered and managed virtually, on a mobile device, on a tablet, on a laptop and all of these form factors are getting smaller and more powerful.  This change has been spurred by advancements in and adoption of cloud computing, virtualization, mobile and social technologies.  Is it a desktop?  Is it a laptop?  Is it a tablet?  Is it a mobile device?  Does it have installed applications or hosted applications?  Yes, it can be all of them and accessed from anywhere and at anytime.  At Quest we are calling this new virtual office the "user workspace."  We are so excited about the opportunity to help our customers wade through and simplify the vast number of issues surrounding the user workspace that we've created a new business unit dedicated to managing it.  Pretty cool, huh?  Check out this video where I discuss our User Workspace Management vision.

Do you think the user workspace is real?  I wasn't sure it was until I conducted an experiment about 6 months ago where I was trying to determine the market opportunity and whether the user workspace concept would resonate with me much less our internal users and customers.   So, I went to China for 2 weeks and all I took was my iPad.  I know … crazy, right?   Now, I have3 devices --  a laptop, a iPhone and an iPad, but I elected to only go with only 1 device.  I went on a hope and prayer that I could be productive both personally and professionally.  Could I access my corporate applications securely through my virtual desktop delivered to my iPad?  Could I FaceTime with my family?  Could I present my Powerpoint presentation easily?  Could I access my cloud-based applications despite Chinese censorship and the Great Firewall?   Could I send and receive email without reconfiguration of my email client?  The short answer — yes.  I was able to do anything I could do with my laptop.  I went from customer to customer, hotel to hotel, Beijing to Shanghai to Hong Kong to Taiwan and was able to connect to WiFi and access my corporate virtual desktop and be completely productive.  On this trip I personally validated the market and knew I wasn’t the only one who travels internationally and has the need to be productive while on the road.  It was awesome!  I knew right then that this was a massive market opportunity that only Quest was poised to capitalize on.  I came back and immediately began to execute on my vision.

Why Quest you say?  With over 100,000 global customers, we have a long history of delivering market-leading products and solutions.  In this case, we have the markets only unique and comprehensive combination of assets from desktop virtualization to VDI assessment to application readiness to mobile device management to identity and access management.  If your users want the flexibility to choose their devices thus increasing productivity and IT has the need to contain costs while delivering user applications in a secure fashion across any device, for any user and accessed from any location — Quest's User Workspace Management portfolio (soon to be branded Quest Workspace®) will address the growing needs of your organization regardless of size.

Source: http://communities.quest.com/community/executive-blog/blog/2012/03/13/quests-vision-of-the-new-user-workspace

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