Comments on: VMware Feeling Pressure as Virtualization Becomes a Commodity

By: the future is here [just not evenly distributed] » Sun’s VirtualBox is a welcome treat

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 04:51:23 +0000

[...] and Parallels. It goes without saying that virtualization technology is becoming more and more commoditized, and open source solutions such as Xen, KVM, and VirtualBox only serve to increase this [...]

By: SRandy

SRandy — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 03:14:23 +0000

I am surprised at the number of articles (even the one in eWeek) which have no basis in the reality of the IT world. I am very much a proponent of Open Source software. After comparing and testing VMWare and Xen, much to my dismay, there was no comparison. VMWare was by far the superior product in performance and capabilities. The OpenSource compeditors are not going to destroy VMWare, just as Linux has not destroyed Windows in the desktop or server market. This is the same scenario with mySQL and Microsoft SQL. mySQL is free; how does MSSQL, Oracle and the like stay in business?
This kind of nonsense is what happens when investors try to comment about an area they have little or no understanding of.

By: F

Mon, 26 Nov 2007 19:37:31 +0000

Did anyone take Jimmy’s advise to buy at 87?
because today’s price is 73. Anyone who thinks that any company has a lock on any technology is fooling themselves. Oracle’s introduction into the VM world does have an affect on EMC’s VM product. Companies who use Oracle will in fact move to their VM product, first because it works, and second just like people moved away from IBM, because of price

By: JVirtual

JVirtual — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 07:04:32 +0000

Dan Kusnetzky needs to install a virtual product and figure out what the heck he is talking about. lol. I run one of the largest data centers in the world. VMware’s product is solid, stable, and is on our roadmap for at least the next 3 years. I am not going back to the drawing board to choose a cheaper product. Give me a break.

By: J

Tue, 20 Nov 2007 05:17:06 +0000

Hypervisor technology is becoming a commodity and will soon make it to the hardware level as we are already seeing and VMware is well aware of this. Everyone is focusing on virtualization however they are missing the big picture. The real value is the ability to manage all these virtual machines to fulfill business objectives. (i.e. Fault-Tolerance, Disaster Recover, DRS, High Availibility, cost reduction, etc.) That is the real value and this is ability is not a commodity and VMware is really the only company that does this and does is well. Oracle is just Xen, which does not offer this, Viridian is a non existant product as a date and that pretty much sums up any possible competition. VirtualIron works very differently and is only practical for certain application.

By: Paul Joncas

Paul Joncas — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 01:21:09 +0000

It is true VMWare has a great product, but they are no longer alone in Virtualization arena. My Company spent a year evaluating VMWare and Virtual Iron after visiting Linux World, and chose Virtual Iron.
VMWare has some bells and whistles that others don’t have at this time, but VI is equivalent when it comes to the key features and capabilities that are the core reason for deploying a virtualized server array. With the release of 4.1 it has only gotten better with less overhead and more features. We are running Virtual Iron in a production environment and it has held up to the demands of our business. I strongly suggest a look at VI before you make the leap to VMWare.

By: John

John — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 21:32:24 +0000

Just when you thought it couldn’t get any worse…

http://www.johnmwillis.com/wp/google/may-a-blue-cloud-rain-good-fortunes-upon-you/

By: Robert

Robert — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 17:57:28 +0000

eWeek thinks VMware is going the way of the dodo bird…

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2216435,00.asp

By: John

John — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 21:24:54 +0000

I guess you missed the part about “Google’s Three Rules”. Cheap and failure are part of their design. When you are building data centers that have over million-core’s you can’t afford to go expensive. Amazon, Google and Rack Space are changing the game and are on the forefront of turning computing power into a true commodity. IMHO, ESX (1 million+) licenses are not going to be part of that game.

By: Jim

Jim — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 20:34:10 +0000

John,
My answer to your reply shown below in quotes is: Even big and good companies make mistakes…
RE:
“John Willis 11/14/07 1:40 pm
“Why would a business buy cheap and get less bang for the buck.”

For example, Google and Amazon. See

http://www.johnmwillis.com/wp/google/should-vmware-worry/“

By: Bernie

Bernie — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 19:09:04 +0000

Too bad people are forced to fill the white space on their websites with regurgitated nonsense.

I love this sentence –

“But its honeymoon seems to have ended along with Daylight Saving Time”

You must be patting yourself on the back for that one!

Including Oracle’s pathetic attempt at entering the virtualization market underscores the fact that this space is very much misunderstood. Find me one enterprise customer who will even consider deploying on Oracle VM. It’s a joke. Next you’ll tell me that mySQL is just as good as Oracle 11i.

By: John Willis

John Willis — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 18:40:29 +0000

“Why would a business buy cheap and get less bang for the buck.”

For example, Google and Amazon. See

http://www.johnmwillis.com/wp/google/should-vmware-worry/

By: Jimmy

Jimmy — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 18:35:13 +0000

This all sounds like it could be the end of the rise of VmWare. However, myself being in the IT field. I can assure you that VmWare is light years ahead of their competitors. And news like Oracle offering Freeware will not make IT Departments move to Oracle. I cant say 2 years down the road VmWare wont have tough competition. But as their competitors develop new technology, VmWare is hard at work doing the same. So to all the Non-Technical investors. Look at the facts, VmWare has doubled their profits every year for last six years or so. 100% of Fortune 100 companies use VmWare, 85% percent of Fortune 1000 companies use VmWare. VmWare is here to stay and teh share prices will continue to rise. My suggestions for buy price would be 87.00 and i will see all of you at $140/share after the earning reports.

By: Robert

Robert — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 18:21:45 +0000

VMware makes great technology, but it costs way too much. Plain and simple. I work for a Fortune 500 company and while we’ve been using VMware for a while, it’s only out of necessity. We can’t wait for some real competition because VMware has been enjoying being the only solution in the market for years and price gouging.

Hypervisors will DEFINITELY be commoditized very soon now (we’re on the trailing edge now) and the prices will finally start to drop. No, I don’t own VMware stock, but if I did, I’d be selling now.

By: LP

LP — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 18:11:15 +0000

If a non-tech savy investor wanted to buy VM stock when would be the best time? Do you all think that it will continue lock up the market or are we close to the real value of the stock?

By: Nathan

Nathan — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 17:29:10 +0000

You also left out that while Windows Server 2008 isn’t due until February 2008, “Hyper-V” isn’t due out for 180 days after that.
Also it won’t even have the features that ESX 3.0 had a year ago, putting it more than 2 years behind in technology.

By: Jim

Jim — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 15:15:01 +0000

Comparing VMware with the other virtualization software is like comparing fruit, but it isn’t the same as comparing apples with apples. VMware is a mature product with much more functionality. Why would a business buy cheap and get less bang for the buck. I have to give businesses more credit than that. They will buy virtualization to make huge productivity gains. That’s where VMware has the market locked up.

By: Alan

Alan — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 15:02:23 +0000

I think your headline is backwards. It’s the other guys that are feeling the pressure to produce a product tomorrow that is equal to what VMware is offering today. While they attempt to add features VMware is hard at work on the next generation of virtualization tools.