Microsoft to Buy Desktop Virtualization Company

Microsoft and Citrix will also collaborate to ensure that the Citrix XenDesktop connection broker works well with Windows Optimized Desktop solutions.

Microsoft expects to release Hyper-V in the third quarter of 2008.

Within three months of then, Microsoft will also release a tool to help customers migrate from the Xen hypervisor to Hyper-V. “It takes the VHD format and converts that to the Hyper-V format seamlessly,” said Orecklin.

Microsoft will also use the Jan. 22 virtualization event to announce that it will cut the annual subscription price of its Windows Vista Enterprise Centralized Desktop by more than two-thirds, to $23 per desktop from $78 previously for rich-client access devices covered by the Windows client Software Assurance program. 

“This price reduction is in the spirit of making this more approachable and available, and we feel it is competitive at this level and strikes the right balance,” Boettcher said.

The licensing for Windows Vista Enterprise Centralized Desktop allows customers to run Windows in virtual machines on servers and access them from either PCs or thin clients.

Microsoft said that Calista, which has about 35 employees, will become a wholly owned Microsoft subsidiary, and will remain in California. Microsoft officials declined to disclose financial details of the deal.