Citrix Education Announces Advanced Certifications for Virtualization

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - Citrix Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CTXS) today announced new advanced certifications targeted at engineers and architects specializing in advanced virtualization solutions. A hot growth area, virtualization technologies help enterprises become more agile, reduce costs and deliver optimal service levels. The updated certifications are Citrix Certified Enterprise Engineer (CCEE) for Virtualization and Citrix Certified Integration Architect (CCIA) for Virtualization.

As enterprises continue to build out their virtualization strategies, they are requiring IT professionals at all levels to have top skills to support this growth. According to a recent article in Virtualization Review, Dice.com reported that the number of jobs for general virtualization skills advertised from January 2008 through the first week of November 2008 increased by 37 percent, when during the same period the total job count was down 12 percent. The new certifications from Citrix are more relevant than ever and will allow qualified professionals to validate their skill sets, which is especially important in today’s competitive job market. The current CCEA and CCIA have been recognized year after year as top-earning IT certifications, and recently earned two spots in Foote Partners’ debut Hot List of top certified skills.

The new CCEE and CCIA expand on the foundation of administrator-level certifications already built to provide IT professionals looking to develop their career in virtualization with a clear certification path.

“While developing the content and requirements for the new CCEE and CCIA certifications, we took great care in ensuring they reflected today’s environment and job roles by doing a lot of listening,” said Julieann Scalisi, managing director of Worldwide Education for Citrix. “First, we needed to ensure that we understood what was most important in terms of the skills needed to be successful. Then, we built the testing of those skills into the certification requirements for each track in a way that was true to the job role and all of its challenges. It was also important to us that we recognize the skills of our existing base of advanced certificants, and make it easier for them to update their certifications. As expected, when we shared our new update plans with our advanced certificants, we received extremely positive reactions.”

Citrix Certified Enterprise Engineer (CCEE) for Virtualization
The CCEE offers seasoned IT professionals the opportunity to develop and validate their operational planning skills with their tactical design expertise and integration know-how. In addition to proving that candidates have mastered the skills required of engineers in virtualized environments, the CCEE for Virtualization also represents breadth and depth of knowledge in its different component technologies, and its requirements are consistent with that concept. Engineers who are new to Citrix certification (i.e. do not possess a legacy Citrix Certified Enterprise Administrator or CCEA certification) must pass a total of five exams: three Citrix Certified Administrator (CCA) entry level exams focused on application, desktop and server virtualization; one advanced application virtualization exam; and one final exam covering integration of end-to-end virtualization solutions.

Although the final CCEE for Virtualization exam will be available at the end of September 2009, CCEE candidates can begin working towards their certification now by preparing for and taking the other required administrator-level exams which are already available.

Citrix Certified Integration Architect (CCIA) for Virtualization
The CCIA track allows IT professionals to hone real world skills, and the CCIA for Virtualization tests a range of skills used to design strategic approaches to virtualization. One integral element of being a successful CCIA is possessing the proper experience, and as such a level of real-world experience is recommended for candidates who choose to pursue this certification. Along with the proper recommended experience, in order to obtain a CCIA for Virtualization candidates must first obtain the CCEE for Virtualization certification, and then pass one final exam. The final CCIA exam will follow the release of the final CCEE exam, a key pre-requisite, with availability in Q4 2009.

Update paths, rewards for currently certified individuals
New to its certification structure, Citrix Education also announced update paths for currently certified CCEA and CCIA professionals. Individuals with these certifications do not have to pass the required Administrator-level exams. In order to update to the CCEE, existing CCEAs need only pass the final CCEE for Virtualization exam, whereas existing CCIA certificants will need to pass both the final CCEE and CCIA for Virtualization exams. The significant reduction in requirements recognizes that this group of individuals have proven they have the necessary administrator-level skills through previous certification.

Due to the ever-changing IT landscape and continued product enhancements, these update options will be available for a limited time only for those holding current advanced certifications. Upon general availability of the new CCEE and CCIA exams in Q4 2009, the date of expiration for multiple legacy CCEA and CCIA certifications will be announced. Those who take advantage of the update path before their legacy certification expires will benefit from the time and cost savings of only taking 1-2 exams, while those who let their certifications expire without updating will be required to start from the beginning, taking all 5-6 required exams.

In the interest of further meeting the needs of Citrix certified professionals, Citrix Education is also delivering new benefits and rewards for those who possess current Citrix certification(s). Earlier this week at Citrix Synergy 2009, certified individuals received special recognition, discounts on registration, admittance to invitation-only events and more.

About Citrix Education
Citrix Education provides Citrix customers and partners with official training and certification programs on Citrix products, technology and best practices. Its robust training curriculum includes instructor-led, virtual instructor-led, and self-paced online courses, as well as virtual practice labs. Industry-recognized Citrix certifications enable IT professionals at every level to prove in-demand skills necessary to build, maintain and maximize Citrix environments. For more information, go to http://www.citrixeducation.com.

About Citrix
Citrix Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CTXS) is the leading provider of virtualization, networking and software as a service technologies for more than 230,000 organizations worldwide. Its Citrix Delivery Center, Citrix Cloud Center (C3) and Citrix Online Services product families radically simplify computing for millions of users, delivering applications as an on-demand service to any user, in any location on any device. Citrix customers include the world’s largest Internet companies, 99 percent of Fortune Global 500 enterprises, and hundreds of thousands of small businesses and prosumers worldwide. Citrix partners with over 10,000 companies worldwide in more than 100 countries. Founded in 1989, annual revenue in 2008 was $1.6 billion.

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