Citrix Systems Inc. ( CTXS - Analyst Report ) has decided to extend its existing business collaboration with NetApp Inc. ( NTAP - Snapshot Report ) for enterprise cloud solutions architecture. Jointly, these two companies will provide a full set of solutions for storage automation, resource allocation, and virtual machine backup and recovery. In a nutshell, the Citrix Cloud Platform will integrate with NetApp unified storage solutions and Data ONTAP storage operating system that will generate a cloud-based storage facility for enterprises.

Citrix Systems solidified its position in the highly lucrative cloud-based data storage segment after its acquisition of ShareFile, a leading provider of secure, cloud-based data storage, sharing and collaboration solutions. As per the company, the personal cloud computing market is expected to become a multi billion dollar opportunity by 2015. ShareFile offers cloud solutions to companies of various types and sizes. Moreover, business enterprises can securely store, synchronize, and share documents both within and outside their setup using ShareFile technology. At present, ShareFile has more than 2 million business users spread across 14,000 paying corporate clients.

Citrix Systems reported robust financial results for the second quarter, 2012, surpassing the Zacks Consensus Estimates. We believe global trends toward virtualization and cloud computing will facilitate Citrix Systems to report strong results. The company continues to grow as virtualization and cloud computing becomes essential for business enterprises to reduce costs at a time when the economy is yet to completely come out of recession. We believe the business fundamentals of the company remain intriguing as the virtualization market will continue to flourish in the near future.