McAfee continues to evolve its business. Only days after launching a new channel partner program, McAfee has partnered up with Citrix Systems on virtual desktop security. Here are the details.

The partnership surfaced at this week’s Citrix Synergy 2010 conference in San Francisco. According to the two companies, Citrix XenDesktop customers can now extend the management of their desktop security out to their VM’s and virtual environments using the McAfee ePolicy Orchestrator platform. In theory, large-scale virtual enterprise deployments will now be made easier, and granular endpoint security policies now made simpler.

Also of note: Citrix will collaborate with McAfee to develop security solutions for VDI-based virtual desktops. Virus scanning with be centralized and all virus scanning and signature file updates will be off-loaded from the VM, dropping the demand on the VM and VM hardware, along with lowering the overhead. (In some ways, I think it sounds eerily similar to Panda Security’s technology).

McAfee and Citrix expect to show the fruits of their labor in the second half of 2010; the solutions will be designed to secure XenDesktop deployments on Citrix XenServer, Microsoft Hyper-V or VMware ESX.

Sign up for MSPmentor’s weekly Enewsletter, Webcasts and Resource Center. And follow us via RSS; Facebook; Identi.ca; and Twitter. Plus, check out more MSP voices at www.MSPtweet.com.