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Citrix Ignites Entrepreneurial Technologies with New Citrix Startup Accelerator

Wednesday 08. December 2010 - Citrix Invests in Long-Term Industry Innovation with Silicon Valley-Based Seed Investment Fund

Citrix Systems today announced the launch of the Citrix Startup Accelerator, a Silicon Valley-based seed investment fund targeting early-stage companies worldwide. This multi-million dollar fund is focused on new technologies or business models that can extend the Citrix virtual computing solution portfolio and contribute to its vision of a world where anyone can work and play from anywhere on any device. Celebrating its 15th anniversary of being a public company this month, Citrix has a strong track record of strategic investment and technology acquisition in Silicon Valley (e.g., Kaviza, NetScaler and XenSource). The Citrix Startup Accelerator initiative will invest in entrepreneur-led innovation, providing participating companies with seed funding, mentoring, subsidized office space and access to the global Citrix ecosystem, partners and customers. By fostering technologies and business models that align with the long term Citrix strategy, the Citrix Startup Accelerator is differentiated from other funds that focus solely on fund maximization.
The Citrix Startup Accelerator will be headed by Martin Duursma, VP of Citrix Labs and Chair of the Citrix CTO Office. “Entrepreneurs are key drivers of disruptive innovation and employment growth,” says Duursma. “The Citrix Startup Accelerator places us at the forefront of industry trends balancing internal and external innovation. We expect our seed investments and entrepreneur-friendly environment to help spur new technologies of strategic importance to Citrix, our customers, and our ecosystem.”
Program Highlights
The Citrix Startup Accelerator will make investments in early-stage organizations that have the potential to enable new capabilities in virtualization, desktop and application delivery, mobile devices, security, authentication, cloud, networking, storage and collaboration/software as a service.
The Citrix Startup Accelerator will be based adjacent to the Citrix Silicon Valley headquarters, enabling entrepreneurs to further benefit from business and technical mentoring from executives at Citrix and throughout Silicon Valley, while remaining in a startup-friendly environment.
Each year, up to 12 companies will join the initiative for up to 18 months. Participating companies need not be based in the Silicon Valley, and in fact will be sought out globally, but will be encouraged to take up residence at the Citrix Startup Accelerator facilities.