OPINION | Companies are increasingly turning to
virtualization to reduced operating costs, consolidate servers, and simplify
the deployment and management of applications.
For many, VMware -- the dominant player in the
field -- is synonymous with virtualization. But the market seems primed for
significant changes.
Indications of a change have been brewing all year. Citrix
acquired XenSource, adding some marketing force and service support muscle for
its customers interested in the virtualization technology. Last month, Oracle
entered the fray, announcing Oracle VM, its virtual machine server certified to
work with the Oracle database, Fusion Middleware, and Oracle Applications.
This month, Microsoft released a beta version of
Hyper-V, its hypervisor technology for Windows Server 2008 (which is to be
launched in late February). The Hyper-V beta was released sooner than expected.
Entry by these players is certain to gain the attention of
IT managers. Of course, the big question is whether Microsoft can increase its
presence in the market at the expense of the clear current market leader,
VMware.
As we all know, this would not be the first time Microsoft
incorporated something into an operating system and changed the marketplace. A
slew of communications software companies that sold dial-up management software
disappeared after dial-up networking was incorporated into the Windows
operating system. IP protocol stack vendors met similar fates. And do we even
need to mention browser vendors?
Perhaps VMware’s lead will be too large to overcome. For its
part, VMware has not stood still. It has added enterprise-class features for load
balancing, high availability, backup, and zero-downtime maintenance.
Additionally, the company has developed technology for a virtual desktop
infrastructure, and it launched a virtual appliances effort that is broadly
supported by many third-party software developers and vendors.
Still, with Oracle, Citrix, and Microsoft all taking dead
aim on the market, 2008 is certain to be a wild time for IT managers looking
for virtualization solutions.
What do you think?
Drop me a note at s.salamone@att.net
and tell me which vendor you think will make the greatest strides in
virtualization in 2008.
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This article first appeared in Bio-IT World’s Inside IT newsletter.
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