NComputing
Encyclopedia
NComputing is a desktop virtualization
company that manufactures hardware and software to create virtual desktops (sometimes called zero clients or thin clients) which enable multiple users to simultaneously share a single operating system instance.
NComputing, based in Redwood City, CA is a privately held for-profit company with offices in the United States
, Australia
, Canada
, China
, Germany
, India
, Korea
, Poland
, Russia
, Spain and the United Kingdom
; and resellers around the world.
, met German entrepreneur Klaus Maier (formerly CEO of hydrapark), who had spent more than ten years developing the core software on which NComputing is based. They formed a team to develop the complementary hardware in Korea, while the software was written in Poland and Russia. After they successfully launched the product and reached $10M revenue in two years, the two founders decided to move its headquarters to Silicon Valley. Stephen Dukker, former chairman of eMachines, joined NComputing in August 2006, to lead the company.
with participation from Scale Venture Partners and South Korea’s Daehong Technew Corp.
The vSpace software allows multiple simultaneous user accounts to run on a single operating system instance. The access devices connect each user’s keyboard, monitor, and mouse to the shared host. Each NComputing access device has ports for a keyboard, monitor, and mouse, but does not contain a CPU nor memory. vSpace can either be deployed alone or in concert with other virtual desktop infrastructure software solutions (including Citrix, VMware and Microsoft).
The company offers three product lines, the X-series, L-series, and U-series, as well as an OEM chip.
In a test published by Computer Aid International
in April 2009 and conducted by three African universities, the X300 turned out to be the preferred solution when setting up computer labs.
and Citrix’s ICA
.
Since the software is proprietary, and the source code is not distributed, only NComputing can maintain it to fix security holes and bugs, which are numerous. For example, GDM hangs when multiple users are logged in, and logging in after logging out has mixed results, including log in failure. The client software and clients themselves require manual registration with Ncomputing through their client software to avoid a 60 minute automatic logout, which precludes automated host deployment.
PC Quest Social Impact Award 2009
CES Innovations 2009 Design and Engineering Awards honoree — Computer Peripherals 2009
Tech Museum of Innovation Economic Development Award Laureate 2008
Deloitte Silicon Valley Technology Fast 50 Rising Star 2008
Frost & Sullivan Green Excellence Award — Thin Clients 2008
Gartner “Cool Vendor” — Client Computing 2008
District Administration Readers’ Choice Top 100 2007–2008
VAR Business Gold 5-Start Partner Program Winner 2008
IT World Canada "Top 5 Business to Watch" 2008
EXPOCOMM Mexico 1st Place — Best Solution for Small Business 2008
Red Herring Top 100 Startups in North America 2008
Wall Street Journal Technology Innovation Award — Computing Systems 2007
Silicon Valley Business Journal Emerging Technology — Green & Clean Finalist 2007
CeBIT Server-Based Computing Award 2006
, and Hewlett-Packard
.
In the education market, NComputing competes with other PC sharing solutions such as Userful
, and student laptop solutions such as OLPC’s XO laptop and Intel’s Classmate PC
.
Desktop virtualization
Desktop virtualization , as a concept, separates a personal computer desktop environment from a physical machine using the client–server model of computing....
company that manufactures hardware and software to create virtual desktops (sometimes called zero clients or thin clients) which enable multiple users to simultaneously share a single operating system instance.
NComputing, based in Redwood City, CA is a privately held for-profit company with offices in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
, China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
, Korea
Korea
Korea ) is an East Asian geographic region that is currently divided into two separate sovereign states — North Korea and South Korea. Located on the Korean Peninsula, Korea is bordered by the People's Republic of China to the northwest, Russia to the northeast, and is separated from Japan to the...
, Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
, Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
, Spain and the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
; and resellers around the world.
Founding the company
In 2003, Young Song, a former VP at eMachinesEMachines
eMachines is a brand of entry level PCs, based in Irvine, California. eMachines employed about 135 employees and sold between 1 to 2 million computers each year before its purchase on January 30, 2004, by rival Gateway Computers...
, met German entrepreneur Klaus Maier (formerly CEO of hydrapark), who had spent more than ten years developing the core software on which NComputing is based. They formed a team to develop the complementary hardware in Korea, while the software was written in Poland and Russia. After they successfully launched the product and reached $10M revenue in two years, the two founders decided to move its headquarters to Silicon Valley. Stephen Dukker, former chairman of eMachines, joined NComputing in August 2006, to lead the company.
Financing
Dukker introduced NComputing to venture capitalists and technology journalists in September 2006 at DEMOfall 06. By October 2006, NComputing had raised $8 million from Scale Venture Partners (formerly known as BA Venture Partners). In January 2008, the company raised a $28 million series B round of financing, led by Silicon Valley venture capital firm Menlo VenturesMenlo Ventures
Menlo Ventures is a venture capital firm located at 3000 Sand Hill Road in Menlo Park, California.The firm was founded as one of the earliest venture capital firms in Silicon Valley in 1976 and provides provides technology venture capital funding for seed, early stage and growth companies...
with participation from Scale Venture Partners and South Korea’s Daehong Technew Corp.
Current growth
The company was founded in 2004 and is the fastest growing desktop virtualization company in the world with over 20 million daily users in 140 countries. It has deals with 40,000 education and business organizations in 140 countries including 5,000 school districts in the United States. NComputing has shipped more than three million units overall, including 180,000 seats to provide one computing seat for every K–12 student in the country of Macedonia. NComputing sells its solutions through value-added resellers around the world. As of 2010, the company has 200 employees worldwide.Products
The combination of NComputing hardware (access devices, thin clients, zero clients) and virtualization software (vSpace desktop virtualization software) use the excess computing capacity of one PC or server to create multiple virtual desktops.The vSpace software allows multiple simultaneous user accounts to run on a single operating system instance. The access devices connect each user’s keyboard, monitor, and mouse to the shared host. Each NComputing access device has ports for a keyboard, monitor, and mouse, but does not contain a CPU nor memory. vSpace can either be deployed alone or in concert with other virtual desktop infrastructure software solutions (including Citrix, VMware and Microsoft).
The company offers three product lines, the X-series, L-series, and U-series, as well as an OEM chip.
X-series - Direct Connect
X-series access devices connect via CAT 5 cable to a PCI card that is installed in a shared PC. The technology supports up to two PCI cards. The maximum distance between the PC and an access device is 10 m (33 ft). The X-series comes in kits which include one PC card and several access terminals, depending on the specific product.In a test published by Computer Aid International
Computer Aid International
Computer Aid International is a not-for-profit organisation active in the field of Information and Communication Technologies for Development. A registered charity, Computer Aid was founded in 1998 to bridge the digital divide by providing refurbished PCs from the UK to educational and non-profit...
in April 2009 and conducted by three African universities, the X300 turned out to be the preferred solution when setting up computer labs.
L-series - Ethernet connect
Unlike the X-series, the NComputing L-series does not use a PCI card. L-series access devices connect each user’s keyboard, mouse,USB foot Padle and monitor back to the shared PC over standard Ethernet cables through a router or switch. An entry-level server supports approximately 30 users. The L-series comes in kits that include NComputing’s vSpace software and one access device.U-series - USB connections
The U-series are the simplest of all to connect, because they connect into USB ports on the host computer, and thus no network switches or PCI cards are required. USB has an inherent distance limt.vSpace software
NComputing’s vSpace virtualization software, included with the hardware, creates the virtual desktops in the shared PC by dividing the computer's resources into independent sessions that give each user their own PC experience. The vSpace software uses the company’s proprietary display and communications protocol ("UXP") to communicate between the shared computer and the user stations. UXP serves a similar purpose as Microsoft’s RDPRemote Desktop Protocol
Remote Desktop Protocol is a proprietary protocol developed by Microsoft, which provides a user with a graphical interface to another computer. The protocol is an extension of the ITU-T T.128 application sharing protocol. Clients exist for most versions of Microsoft Windows , Linux, Unix, Mac OS...
and Citrix’s ICA
Independent Computing Architecture
Independent Computing Architecture is a proprietary protocol for an application server system, designed by Citrix Systems. The protocol lays down a specification for passing data between server and clients, but is not bound to any one platform....
.
Linux support
Linux is supported with proprietary software, including a kernel module. Currently, NComputing offers support for Ubuntu 8.10 for the L130 and L230 series and 10.04 for the L300, U-series, and X350/X550. A stable version of their proprietary software was released in April 2011.Since the software is proprietary, and the source code is not distributed, only NComputing can maintain it to fix security holes and bugs, which are numerous. For example, GDM hangs when multiple users are logged in, and logging in after logging out has mixed results, including log in failure. The client software and clients themselves require manual registration with Ncomputing through their client software to avoid a 60 minute automatic logout, which precludes automated host deployment.
Windows support
Windows XP is supported with proprietary software, including a kernel module. Windows Vista is already supported. In 2011, the vSpace software only supports Windows 7 Professional Edition for the L-series.Notable Employees
- Raj Dhingra, a former executive at Citrix, joined in April 2011 and is CEO of the company.
- Stephen Dukker, former chairman of eMachinesEMachineseMachines is a brand of entry level PCs, based in Irvine, California. eMachines employed about 135 employees and sold between 1 to 2 million computers each year before its purchase on January 30, 2004, by rival Gateway Computers...
, is Chairman of the company. - Will Poole, former head of Microsoft’s Unlimited Potential Group, joined as co-chairman in September 2008.
Founders
- Young Song, former co-founder of eMachinesEMachineseMachines is a brand of entry level PCs, based in Irvine, California. eMachines employed about 135 employees and sold between 1 to 2 million computers each year before its purchase on January 30, 2004, by rival Gateway Computers...
, is a Director of the Board of the company. - Klaus Maier, was former CTO of the company.
Awards
InfoWorld's 2010 Green 15 AwardPC Quest Social Impact Award 2009
CES Innovations 2009 Design and Engineering Awards honoree — Computer Peripherals 2009
Tech Museum of Innovation Economic Development Award Laureate 2008
Deloitte Silicon Valley Technology Fast 50 Rising Star 2008
Frost & Sullivan Green Excellence Award — Thin Clients 2008
Gartner “Cool Vendor” — Client Computing 2008
District Administration Readers’ Choice Top 100 2007–2008
VAR Business Gold 5-Start Partner Program Winner 2008
IT World Canada "Top 5 Business to Watch" 2008
EXPOCOMM Mexico 1st Place — Best Solution for Small Business 2008
Red Herring Top 100 Startups in North America 2008
Wall Street Journal Technology Innovation Award — Computing Systems 2007
Silicon Valley Business Journal Emerging Technology — Green & Clean Finalist 2007
CeBIT Server-Based Computing Award 2006
Competitors
NComputing competes with traditional thin client companies such as WyseWyse
Wyse Technology is an American company that is a leading manufacturer in Cloud Client Computing. Products include thin client hardware and software as well as desktop virtualization. Other products include cloud software-supporting desktop computers, laptops, and mobile devices...
, and Hewlett-Packard
Hewlett-Packard
Hewlett-Packard Company or HP is an American multinational information technology corporation headquartered in Palo Alto, California, USA that provides products, technologies, softwares, solutions and services to consumers, small- and medium-sized businesses and large enterprises, including...
.
In the education market, NComputing competes with other PC sharing solutions such as Userful
Userful
Userful is a desktop virtualization company that develops software to create Linux-based remotely managed virtual desktops that enable up to 10 users to simultaneously share one computer...
, and student laptop solutions such as OLPC’s XO laptop and Intel’s Classmate PC
Classmate PC
The Classmate PC, formerly known as Eduwise, is Intel's entry into the market for low-cost personal computers for children in the developing world. It is in some respects similar to the One Laptop Per Child trade association's Children's Machine , which has a similar target market...
.