With a most recent document titled Magic Quadrant for x86 Server Virtualization Infrastructure from Gartner RAS Core Research, published May 26th, 2010, the results outlined within the document were quite interesting to say the least.
The document focused on two extremely important market trends: infrastructure modernization and cloud computing. Both of these trends include virtualization as the foundation and enabler in how businesses will manage, deploy and deliver IT.
Key Points of Consideration within the Gartner document include:
1. Server virtualization for x86 architecture servers is one of the hottest trends in IT today, and will remain so for several years;
2. X86 server virtualization infrastructure provides the foundation for new management and automation tools, new security architectures, and new processes;
3. While VMware, as the market pioneer, has the lion’s share of the market today, the market will grow, in terms of volume, five-fold during the next three years;
4. A large percentage of companies (mostly small and midsize) have not yet started to virtualize, and they have choices that didn’t exist nine years ago.
5. While customer value will continue to shift to add-on tools and technologies for this virtualization infrastructure market, the low level virtualization platform will remain the foundation for those tools, thus will remain important.
What really hit home in this document was the vast majority of untouched SMBs yet to move forward with server virtualization technologies as the foundation to their desktop virtualization strategies.
Could VMware beat Microsoft to the punch when tackling the SMB market?
Key Points to consider:
1. While VMware has the lion’s share of the enterprise virtualization market, the SMB market is splintered. Source: InfoWorld, July 14th, 2010, David Marshall
2. With the release of VMware vSphere 4.1, VMware hopes to lure the elusive and price-conscious small and midsize businesses that are still, in many cases, in the early stages of trying to figure out their virtualization strategies. Source: InfoWorld, July 14th, 2010, David Marshall
3. When SMBs virtualize, they go from zero to 100 percent – unlike large enterprises. SMBs are also unlikely to change systems software once they make their choices and can live with it; or, run out of money to buy an alternative. Source:http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2010/07/20/vmware_q2_2010_numbers/print.html
Microsoft’s Challenges:
1. To protect and grow its (Microsoft’s) installed base and technology leadership in a rapidly evolving virtualization market;
2. Uphill battle breaking into a very strong VMware installed base, especially in large enterprises;
3. A race to capture the large percentage of SMBs that have not yet started to virtualize and now SMBs have choices that did not exist 9 years ago;
4. VMware’s push of x86 servers will considerably hinder the sales of Microsoft server 2008R2 for the next several years.
For SMBs and a server + desktop virtualization strategy, Microsoft’s Hyper-V + RDS (Remote Desktop Services) is not enough. Nor will a vast majority of SMBs make the move to SCVMM (System Center Virtual Machine Manager) and Microsoft cannot make the assumption that they will.
Thus, in order to get the feature sets SMBs require for a server + desktop virtualization strategy, SMBs will consider different viable options, given that there are more alternatives to choose from now – including VMware vSphere 4.1.
How Does desktopsites’ Konect Elite solution Simplify the Complex and secure Microsoft’s doorway into the SMB market?
Being an SMB ourselves, and working intimately with Microsoft SMB resellers and IT consultants, the answer is quite simple: Give SMBs what they need – simply, efficiently & cost effectively. Bottom Line: Microsoft Hyper-V + Konect Elite - thereby removing the doorway of opportunity for VMware to slip thru the cracks.
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