Chromebooks are slowly gaining traction among consumers as most of the average user's computing activities can be done through a web browser nowadays. But making strides into the business world poses different challenges as companies depend on legacy software and existing workflows. To that end Google has announced a partnership with VMWare to offer an interim step of sorts into the cloud era.
The tie-up will allow business users to access traditional Windows applications and desktops on Chromebooks via VMware's Desktop as a Service (DaaS) platform, according to Google's announcement.
Although remote access to Windows from Chrome OS was already possible through Google's own Remote Desktop app and a handful of third party options, these solutions don't always offer security features on par with what enterprises require. VMWare is also a familiar name within the enterprise and Google says their platform is optimized to manage desktop environments and apps as cloud services.
Although Google would certainly rather see businesses adopting web-based alternatives than holding on to legacy software, the reality is these things take time and are expensive. This deal lets enterprises keep coverage for their legacy apps, while deploying a low cost cloud-first form factor.
Google didn't pass on the opportunity to comment on the benefits of its platform, arguing that as Windows XP nears its EOL, "deploying Chromebooks and taking advantage of a DaaS environment ensures that security vulnerabilities, application compatibility and migration budgets will be a thing of the past."