Parallels RAS Provides High-Quality Replacement for Citrix to Rawls College of Business
Last updated on May 27, 2019
Rawls College of Business chose the award-winning virtualization solution Parallels Remote Application Server (RAS) to replace their previous Citrix-based system, which was too complex and didn’t provide stable access to learning applications for students and staff on personal devices. With Parallels RAS, the organization not only saved money immediately on lower licensing costs, but it could also leverage the application delivery solution to implement bring-your-own-device (BYOD) policy. . To further lower costs, Rawls College of Business used comprehensive virtualization combined to bring down hardware costs by delaying expensive hardware upgrades.
Rawls College of Business at Texas Tech University
The Rawls College of Business (http://www.depts.ttu.edu/rawlsbusiness/), which is named after Texas Tech alumnus Jerry S. Rawls, offers extensive undergraduate and graduate programs designed to give students an in-depth understanding of the business world, and prepare them for successful careers as leaders, managers, executives, and innovators in their chosen field. The Rawls College prides itself on its ability to foster tomorrow’s thought leaders, develop innovative programs that meet industry demands, expand its alumni network, and hire renowned faculty.
The diverse student body includes almost 5,000 undergraduate and graduate students who have the opportunity to pursue futures in accounting, energy commerce, finance, health organization management, management information systems, management, and marketing and supply chain management.
The Challenge: High cost and Integration Challenges Presented By Citrix
Rawls College of Business relied on Citrix before Parallels Remote Application Server (RAS) to provide them with a virtual application publishing solution for between 26-100 concurrent users at any given time. The institution needed to publish applications, including Microsoft Office Suite, to a wide range of devices including Windows, Mac, Android, iPhone/iPad, and Microsoft Surface. Rawls College also required a virtualization solution that supported cloud provider Amazon Web Services (AWS) as well as Dropbox for Business.
With Citrix, the high licensing costs were cutting a large hole in the IT budget. However, the Citrix environment was not only expensive to maintain, but it was also difficult to integrate with other server farms on the campus. Moreover, Citrix Virtual Apps (formerly Citrix XenApp) and Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktop (formerly Citrix XenDesktop) solutions required complicated additions and further purchases in order to achieve a truly comprehensive virtualization solution.
To simplify and better integrate their virtual application solution, Rawls College began searching for a VDI solution that was more with their organization’s needs.
Solution: Parallels Remote Application Server (RAS)
Primarily, Rawls College decided to switch to Parallels Remote Application Server (RAS) because of its easy implementation and favorable price point in comparison to Citrix. Not only that, but the Parallels RAS solution was more stable and user-friendly than Citrix for students, staff, and faculty at the institution.
The flexibility to use Parallels RAS with multiple VDIs including both Hyper-V and VMware was also a “huge benefit,” according to Dayton Perrin, who is a Server Administrator at Rawls College.
“Parallels RAS is easier to implement and the cost is much more favorable to Citrix. We can quickly and easily deploy published applications with any virtual or physical server in our environment.”
Dayton Perrin
Server Administrator III at Rawls College
Key Benefits: Easy to set up, integrated mobile controls
The key benefits of implementing Parallels RAS for Rawls College were wide ranging. First off, the overall simplicity of the solution streamlined virtualization and application publishing. Secondly, the fast implementation and ease of use saved valuable time and money, including fewer IT certification trainings and expensive consultants as well as a reduction is end user support requests. With Parallels RAS, Rawls College could now manage their entire virtualization solution on Windows Server 2003- 2016 through one pane of glass.
Perrin also pointed out that the Parallels RAS wizards simplified many time consuming tasks, which further lowered costs. The organization could also implement bring-your-own-device (BYOD) and carry-your-own-device (CYOD) policies. This brought down hardware costs and improved the user experience for faculty and students who wanted to use their devices while accessing learning applications. Parallels RAS made it simple to deploy virtual applications and desktops to any device remotely without needing to physically touch the device.
“Not only is Parallels RAS much cheaper than Citrix, it is more stable, and more user friendly for our Faculty, Staff and Students at our business college,” said Perrin.
Another major benefit was the streamlined migration process, which took only one day to complete instead of months. Overall, by implementing Parallels RAS, Rawls College was able to enjoy a much lower Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) including lower licensing and all-in-one virtualization features such as automatic load balancing available upon the out-of-the-box installation.
“Within a single day we were able to set up Parallels and have a published application running in our environment. The performance of Parallels RAS is fantastic and provides our business college with the tools to meet any request from our Faculty, Staff and Students.”
Dayton Perrin
Server Administrator III at Rawls College
About Parallels RAS
Parallels Remote Application Server (RAS) makes VDI and virtual application delivery easy to manage and affordable to deploy. Among its competitors, Parallels RAS features the top mobile experience within iOS and Android clients by supporting native touch gestures. The cloud-ready virtualization solution Parallels RAS is fully functional on Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure cloud, on-premises networks, and hybrid deployments.
Find out why 5,000 organizations use Parallels RAS to deliver virtual applications and desktops to their employees on any device imaginable.
