VMware has taken the plunge into providing cloud computing services for its customers – but believes it has come up with a model that users will find compelling.
Regional VP Matt Piercy yesterday told delegates to VMware Forum 2013 that the company believes in the concept of a hybrid cloud that allows companies to seamlessly move workloads between their own data centres and their cloud provider.
This hybrid cloud was launched a couple of weeks ago in the US, and VMware is on an aggressive drive to roll it out in Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) as quickly as possible.
In fact, he believes the South African subsidiary will be able to offer hybrid cloud solutions by early 2014.
Piercy explains the VMware has set up its own data centres in the US, but hasn’t yet decided whether to do the same in other markets.
A team has been deployed to examine each market and decide on the best approach for that country or region, he adds. The final offering could be a VMware-owned data centre, or a collaborative effort with an existing data centre depending upon market requirements.
Because the VMware data centre is built on exactly the same VMware technology as it deployed within customers’ own data centre environments, Piercy says the hybrid cloud is an attractive proposition.
“This is the different in what we are doing compared to other cloud providers,” he says. “We are the only solution that allows customers to take a standardised workload and deploy it either their own data centre, in the public cloud, or in a combination of both.
“We are creating standardisation between the data centres and we believe this is a compelling story that resonates with our customers.”
Although customers are concerned about being locked into a specific cloud provider – something that many of the large cloud providers do – can rest assured that using the4 VMware public cloud doesn’t require any re-engineering or rewriting of their applications.
“What we are bringing to market is something that’s standard,” he says. “The only possible lock-in is on VMware technology – and it’s the same VMware technology that the customer is already running in the data centre anyway. We are using what the customer has already go.”
VMware already partners with cloud computing providers, and these relationships will not be affected by the new cloud offering, Piercy adds. Rather, the new service will complement that offered by partners.