INTERVIEW-UPDATE 1-Citrix sees robust orders, more acquisitions

* to invest $200 mln in second R&D centre in India

* to add 500 engineering jobs in India over next 5 yrs

* says "feels good" about outlook for rest of 2008

* to make a handful of acquisitions in second half

* to close a handful of contracts valued at $1-$2 mln per qtr (Adds details)

By Jennifer Tan

SINGAPORE, June 18 (Reuters) - Software maker Citrix Systems Inc (CTXS.O) expects orders to remain robust in the second half of 2008, as growth in its international operations outpaces a slowing market in the United States.

"We feel good about the outlook for the balance of the year, with all our international markets growing substantially faster than the U.S. market," Citrix Chief Financial Officer David Henshall told Reuters in an interview in Singapore.

"A lot of metrics continue to look really solid, largely because we are broadly diversified from a geographical standpoint and an industry standpoint, and our transaction values are relatively low for most of our customers," he added.

U.S.-based Citrix develops virtualisation software that allows a single computer to perform the work of several, expanding its capacity to process multiple applications and operating systems.

The technology, which challenges the software industry's traditional business model, helps companies save on hardware and power costs by running existing machines more efficiently and deploying applications faster, without worrying that various types of software will clash with each other.

Henshall said Citrix's average contract size ranged between $50,000 and $100,000, but the company expects to close a few large-sized deals of above $1 million every quarter.

"For us, large transactions are generally in that $1-$2 million range, and we do a handful of those every quarter -- we will have a number of large transactions, with most of them in the fourth quarter," he added.

India and China were among the two markets that offered tremendous growth potential, particularly in the banking, telecoms and retail industries, Henshall said.

Most of the demand comes from customers expanding their branch offices, deploying security and mobile applications, and consolidating their operations through mergers and acquisitions.

"These markets represent the strong infrastructure growth taking place across the region," he added.

Citrix plans to invest $200 million in a second research and development facility in India over the next five years, and to add another 500 engineering jobs over that period.

Within the virtualisation market, Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O) leads a number of software makers, including Oracle Corp (ORCL.O) and Sun Microsystems Inc JAVA.O, in a bid to close the gap with VMware Inc (VMW.N), which holds a 70 percent share of the market.

VMware went public last year in one of the hottest technology initial public offering in years, with its shares more than quadrupling from an issue price of $29 apiece.

Henshall said Citrix was also looking to grow through small-sized acquisitions, and expects to close a few purchases, focusing on specific technologies, later this year.

The company has bought 16 firms in the last four years, the latest acquisition being privately held XenSource Inc last year in a deal valued at about $500 million.

"We already did three in the first quarter, and expect to do a handful for the balance of the year," Henshall said, adding that these acquisition talks were always "ongoing". (Editing by Lincoln Feast) (jennifer.tan@thomsonreuters.com; +65-6403 5660; Reuters Messaging: jennifer.tan.reuters.com@reuters.net)

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