Citrix Adds Workspace App Integrations to Teams, Zoom, G Suite

New integrations to the Citrix Workspace app platform bring added support for Microsoft Teams, Slack, Zoom and Google G Suite. The company showcased the platform’s latest hooks during Thursday’s virtual Citrix Workspace Summit, where company leaders described expanded opportunities for partners.

Citrix Workspace app, which the company released more than two years ago, is a cloud-native digital user experience. Citrix designed it to run on any device. The workspace app is the evolution of Citrix Receiver, the client component of the company’s original XenDesktop and XenApp. The Workspace app platform manages enterprise apps, desktops and users based on modern, cloud-native microapps.

Demand for the Citrix Workspace app platform was initially tepid, usurped by Citrix traditional VDI solutions. While sales of its cloud-based workspace solution started to pick up, it accelerated following outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Citrix’s David Henshall

“These last few months have really driven an uptick in the interest for the Citrix Workspace as a way to power consistent user experience,” Citrix CEO David Henshall said during the virtual event. “A massive shift to remote work means that right now, technology is the primary driver of employee experience. The Citrix Workspace provides organizations with a competitive edge, by delivering everything employees need to be productive. [That includes] apps, content, business services, all in one unified experience, regardless of where that work needs to get done.”

Besides virtual desktops, the Citrix Workspace platform provides a digital user experience to manage SaaS solutions and legacy software. Citrix claims it has connectors to hundreds of devices. Hector Lima, Citrix SVP for worldwide customer success, described the latest integrations during the Citrix Workspace Summit.

Connectors to Teams, Slack, Zoom, G Suite

The Microsoft Teams experience for Citrix Workspace lets users securely share information. They can also manage their meetings and Teams channel experiences, Lima said.

“If someone messages you in Teams, the workspace notifies you based on filters that you’ve set up,” Lima said. “You can also quickly create, start or join meetings, and create new channels and teams all via the workspace. Through Teams VDI optimization within the Citrix Workspace, employees will see a more consistent and secure team experience.”

The integration with Slack aims to reduce application switching by showing relevant Slack content in a user’s workspace feed. It takes key information and pushes it from Slack to workspace.

Citrix’s Hector Lima

“You have the ability to send messages from the workspace to specific channels, send direct messages, flag mentions with corresponding actions, all within the workspace,” Lima added.

The Zoom connector lets users create and view meetings within the workspace.

“Zoom has seen increasing adoption over this year,” he said. “So, we’ve made sure it’s integrated into the workspace as well.”

Citrix also added connectors to Google Identity and G Suite. The integration with Google Identity provides single sign-on access from Citrix Workspace to G Suite email, without having to re-enter credentials. It is also designed to ease access to users’ calendars and …

… companion G Suite calendar applications.

“All of this is integrated in the broader Google ecosystem via the workspace app for Chrome Enterprise, providing unified access to all enterprise resources and applications on Chrome devices, and integration with Chrome enterprise security,” Lima said.

Custom Microapps

Lima said Citrix is investing in the workspace platform to enable organizations and partners to create custom microapps. Microapps are important, he explained, because “companies can eliminate the need for an employee to interact with multiple applications across different UIs.”

Also, the Citrix Workspace platform provides one interface to all the workflows employees need to perform their jobs, he said.

The platform has opened the way for developers to build integrations and apps with its low-code, microapps builder tool. Besides general-purpose integration, Lima said it is designed to accept data over incoming web hooks. Developers submit the integrations to Citrix for validation.

“Developers have the ability to orchestrate and automate complicated business processes and workflows that integrate multiple back-end systems across multiple applications,” he said. The applications automate repetitive tasks and produce “consumer-friendly microapps with modern UIs for the desktop, and mobile,” he added.

Expanding the Partner Ecosystem

The Citrix Workspace App platform has opened opportunities for different types of partners, according to Citrix channel chief Bronwyn Hastings. Many of its global system integrator (GSI) partners – including Capgemini, Cognizant, Deloitte, Fujitsu, Tata Consultancy Services and Wipro – are developing on the platform.

Citrix’s Bronwyn Hastings

“Some GSIs are building broad competencies and innovations around Citrix Workspace as an organizing function of the digital transformation they’re going through,” she said. “This allows for evolution into a truly hybrid organization by shifting pieces of your IT footprint to the cloud by maintaining an on-prem presence as well. Other GSIs are building competencies and innovations around Citrix Workspace as a means of modernizing employees’ experience and transforming the workplace. This results in moving from disparate applications to unified, organized and very secure and intelligent workspaces that enable effective work.”

New partners have also embraced the Citrix Workspace app platform. Citrix this week expanded its partnership with Upwork, the online service that manages freelance technology and business professionals with employers. Earlier this year, the two companies announced the Upwork Talent Solution with Citrix Workspace. The companies say it allows organizations to provide secure but consistent worker access to apps, information and other business services.

The new offering announced this week, Upwork Microapps for Citrix Workspace, aims to provide microapps that employers can use to post new jobs, and review proposals and resumes from candidates..

“Our partnership with Upwork is especially relevant as organizations consider the long-term remote work, and the hybrid return-to-office strategies and move to the cloud,” Hastings said.