The Next Kingpin of Virtualization

In general, a spin-off is defined as the dissociation of a subsidiary from its parent which subsequently works as an independent major company.

The following spin-off announcements got major attention last month on Tech News:

•  Hewlett-Packard has announced its split into two company’s on Oct 6th.
•  PayPal’s getting spin-off from eBay.

Following this announcement, other major spin-off talks started doing the rounds in the market and the one that really caught the eye was the rumored VMWare spin-off from EMC due to pressure from a major shareholder.

We all know who VMWare is and what it is capable of. After all, they are the pioneers of virtualization and one of the most successful enterprise giants. The company had seamless growth over a long period and even after getting competitors in recent times like Hyper-V, Xen, LDOM etc., it still holds its place dearly as the key player of Virtualization industry. But on top of all this, one should be aware of the fact that it is being backed by EMC, one of the most prominent players in the storage domain.

Twist in Virtualization Market

But if sources were to be believed and assuming that the spin-off is about to happen, then clearly it will be a major leap-back in terms of the support that it has received from the parent company for it’s growth. Meanwhile, the other competitors waiting in the wings will have a huge chance to take a shot at the market share of VMWare, especially Hyper-V.  Well, based on what we know about the Microsoft strategy, despite their image of tending to stay behind the curve while entering new markets, be it virtualization or cloud or mobile market with MDM, it is firmly committed to positioning Hyper-V for the long term as a viable and sound alternative in this market. And their growth has shown to be steadily increasing over a period of time.

As for the cloud, Amazon remains the major player and Microsoft stands next pulling Google behind it to the third position with its revenue this year. But in the Virtualization market, Hyper-V’s hold is almost nearing that of VMWare and this could be an easy gainer for Microsoft if the spin-off were to take place.

All said and done, everyone has come to accept the fact that Virtualization and Cloud are the most dominant paradigms that are expected to continue growing rapidly. It is certainly interesting to keep an eye out on Microsoft which is straddling these areas with both its Hyper-V and private cloud alternative, Microsoft Azure. Hyper-V can define itself in the future by offering a feasible platform for the adoption of a range of virtualized solutions over the cloud such as business continuity, for instance. All these possibilities are hugely positive for Microsoft.

Our take is that Hyper-V will be the Next KingPin of Virtualization market.