Change is Coming to PC Life Cycle Configuration Management

It's amazing how little the market for desktop management software has changed in the past 2 decades. And it's hard to believe the same products are still being used to configure, patch, and deploy OS images and applications and manage user settings now as then.

Ok, the names and owners have changed. Microsoft Systems Management Server (SMS) 1.0 was introduced in 1994, and after numerous iterations, evolved into what is now Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager. LANdesk Manager was started in 1985, acquired by Intel in 1991, spun off as an independent company in 2002, and acquired by Avocent in 2006. But again, basically same code, same product.

Not surprisingly, with such a slow pace of innovation, IT has had a love/hate relationship with these products. According to Gartner's just-released Magic Quadrant for PC Life Cycle Configuration Management, the multi-billion market grew 16% from '06-'07. But despite these healthy numbers, customers show little loyalty, cycling through products every 3-5 years with varying degrees of success. Says Gartner, "We continue to find replacements occurring in the large enterprise segment of the market. This is typically driven by new requirements that aren't addressed quickly enough by the incumbent vendor, or by the perception that the vendor has shifted its focus or priorities." Many analysts, including Gartner, also report that these incumbent products are very difficult and labor-intensive to implement and support.

What's going to breathe new life into this stagnant category, and deliver the implementation results that IT has been eagerly awaiting for over 20 years? Desktop virtualization. A new category of PC configuration management software that leverages virtualization techology will radically reduce the operational costs of managing all desktops - thin clients, notebooks, PC workstations - while simultaneously offering unprecedented improvements in security, information availability, and worker productivity.

Gartner hints at these coming changes when it says "The PC life cycle configuration management tool market is mature, but virtualization, mobility, and the convergence of security and operations are affecting customer buying decisions as well as vendor R&D investments."

Unidesk is hard at work building just such a disruptive technology, and we'll soon be demonstrating it to our Community. Later this year, we'll publicly introduce the software that we think will shake up the PC Life Cycle Configuration Management market. After 20 years, we think change is long overdue!

What do you think about this market? Which of your requirements haven't been met by the current crop of solutions? Let us know what change you'd like to see.

-Tom Rose
Chief Marketing Officer, Unidesk