Leostream is a company that has developed a platform that supports customers with hosted desktop environments, including VDI, hybrid cloud, and high-performance display protocols. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Leostream CEO Karen Gondoly to learn more.
Karen Gondoly’s Background
By training, Gondoly is a rocket scientist with a B.S. and M.S. in Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering from MIT with a master’s focus on control system design.
“I ultimately landed at The MathWorks, where I was the original developer for the graphical user interfaces for the Control Systems Toolbox,” said Gondoly. “After a brief hiatus as a pastry chef at several highly renowned restaurants in Boston, I landed at Leostream as the Product Manager. Over time, I became the COO and, now, CEO.”
Formation Of Leostream
How did the idea for Leostream come together? “Leostream was founded in 2002 by a couple of experts in the industry who saw gaps in the evolving virtualization market. Their journey started with a tool called the Virtual Machine Manager, which was essentially the precursor to VMware vCenter, and a P2V Converter, which made it easy to convert a physical server into a virtual machine imported into one of the, at the time, current hypervisors,” Gondoly reflected. “As virtualization became more mainstream, the need for a P2V Converter waned, and Leostream focused its efforts on the Virtual Machine Manager, which evolved into a VDI Connection Broker and, ultimately, the Leostream Platform that we provide today.”
Favorite Memory
What has been your favorite memory working for Leostream so far? “Receiving the phone call from the Television Academy in the summer of 2022, letting Leostream know our Remote Desktop Access Platform won an Engineering, Science, and Technology Emmy,” Gondoly shared.
Macroeconomic Climate
Has the current macroeconomic climate had any effect on the company? “Leostream is fortunate in that the inclusion of our software into an organization’s IT stack allows them to secure access to their end-user computing environments, with a focus on the word secure,” Gondoly acknowledged. “Organizations can’t consider the current macroeconomic climate in a vacuum and instead must consider it alongside the current uptick in cybercrime and the current push towards hybrid work. Taken all together, budgets dedicated to security are currently proving more resilient than those for other parts of IT spending, and Leostream is a crucial solution for securing remote desktop access.”
Core Products
What are Leostream’s core products and features? “Leostream is here to make connecting people and business initiatives seamless and easy. Our renowned Remote Desktop Access Platform enables IT professionals to connect their organization’s workforce—providing seamless work-from-anywhere flexibility while ensuring workforce efficiency and providing IT with constant visibility of user access, security, cost management, and adequate desktop capacity across all platforms – all through a single pane of glass. No more headaches, no more hassles,” Gondoly explained. “Leostream enables organizations to build their end-user computing environment to their exact needs, all while using best-in-breed technology without being locked into a single technology solution. Users can connect to anything, anywhere, anytime, and from any device, quickly and securely—all through our highly-granular access controls designed for managing and authenticating end-user connections. And when required, our audit-level logging provides comprehensive tracking of all access and usage.”
Evolution Of Leostream’s Technology
“Leostream technology is constantly evolving, driven by customer feedback and our commitment to their success. This feedback drives us to invest in solutions that meet our customer’s needs, continually offering solutions that keep them ahead of the curve. For example, originally, our platform was deployed entirely on-premises and mainly consisted of our Connection Broker. We introduced our Leostream Gateway for remote access a year or so ahead of the pandemic and because of it, our customers were more easily equipped to pivot to support remote work,” Gondoly commented. “We keep a constant pulse on the remote desktop landscape, anticipating new technologies and supporting new workflows long before they become mainstream to ensure that our clients are always prepared for what’s next. As another example, we just released support for Amazon WorkSpaces Core so that Leostream customers can leverage Amazon IaaS for VDI alongside on-premises virtualization and other cloud technologies. At Leostream, we are committed to helping organizations modernize their workforce and embrace the power of remote work.”
Significant Milestones
What have been some of Leostream’s most significant milestones? “Every major platform release is a significant milestone for Leostream,” Gondoly pointed out. “Our 9.0 release in 2019 solidified the Leostream Gateway as a key component in the Leostream Platform and made Leostream a true hybrid-cloud remote access solution, which catapulted Leostream’s growth at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. Our 2022 release signaled our transition to a subscription-based licensing model so we can provide continuous updates to our subscribers throughout the lifespan of version 202x.”
Customer Success Story
When I asked Gondoly about a customer success story, she cited that the company has several published case studies for Media & Entertainment customers, but her personal favorite stories are those that make a human impact.
“For example, we donated licenses to the Houston Grand Opera after they were devastated by Hurricane Harvey in the fall of 2017. The thank you letter they sent us read, “Leostream has been instrumental in allowing our staff connectivity to our constituency, the lifeblood of our organization,” Gondoly revealed.
Revenue Model
Leostream generates all of its revenue through software sales and professional services to support that software. And the company is fortunate enough to be cash flow positive without requiring additional funding since the original rounds in 2008.
Total Addressable Market
What total addressable market (TAM) size is Leostream pursuing? “Sales in the global Desktop as a Service (DaaS) Market are slated to top $5.5 billion in 2022. Expanding at a healthy 18.1% CAGR, the market size is projected to total $17.8 billion by 2029 (Source),” Gondoly assessed. “In this space, a Leostream customer is any enterprise organization that has demanding workloads with specialized remote graphic needs. A typical use case is remote access to high-performance physical or virtual workstations rather than commodity desktops and apps. Leostream customer segmentation focuses on Media and Entertainment, DoD and Aerospace, Oil and Gas, Financial Trading, and Engineering and Manufacturing.”
Differentiation From The Competition
What differentiates Leostream from its competition? “With the Leostream platform, our differentiation begins with insight paired with simplicity. Powered by a single-pane-of-glass admin console, our platform simplifies the management of users, desktops, and IT assets across platforms—all with real-time dashboard updates to view usage and environment details, helping IT to make informed decisions,” Gondoly compared. “Beyond the flexibility and freedom of choice that our platform provides for our customers, we also pride ourselves on our unique corporate culture. Our team members are forever-passionate about solving problems and are excited to work with customers to find the best solutions for their needs.”
Future Company Goals
What are some of Leostream’s future company goals? “The cloud is becoming an increasingly important technology for organizations to leverage for their end-user computing needs and we’re, therefore, dedicating part of our roadmap specifically to enhancing our support for AWS,” Gondoly concluded. “Ultimately, we want “Leostream” to be the first word that pops to mind when someone in IT needs to secure remote access in a hybrid cloud for their hybrid workforce. But, we do realize that Leostream is just one piece of the end-user computing puzzle and so Leostream has short and longer term goals to grow a network of solutions providers and system integrators that can leverage Leostream to expand their businesses in bigger and better ways.”
