Branch offices typically require a number of servers and networking appliances with no onsite IT personnel to manage the boxes. Citrix, in partnership with Microsoft, has released a product called Branch Repeater that combines a number of services – Windows services as well as WAN acceleration and application delivery – in one appliance.

With a list price starting at $5,500, the Branch Repeater provides the following services:

· Staging Streamed Applications Closer to Branch Office Users: Centralizing applications on a server and streaming them to individual desktops with application virtualization has cost savings potential. However the distances, limited bandwidth and network latency of branch offices present a problem for this model. Branch repeater acts as a kind of remote cache for streamed applications. The application is streamed from a Citrix XenApp server (previously known as Presentation Server) at the central office to the Branch Repeater where it can be “rebroadcast” to individual desktops.