I’m an avid tennis fan, and with the Australian Open into its second week, it will come as no surprise (least of all to my wife) that tennis is top of mind for me right now. I recently read an article on the evolution of tennis racquets over the history of the game. It turns out that the availability of light-weight aluminum racquets in the late 1960s was a major inflection point. What was particularly fascinating to me is that despite their obvious superiority, these racquets were initially spurned by many professional players, who continued to rely on wooden equipment. No doubt these players were lulled into a false sense of security by the (incremental) improvements touted by wooden racquet manufacturers (many of whom are no longer in business). Ultimately, players like Jimmy Connors, who pioneered the use of aluminum racquets, were able to blaze their way to glory partly because they had realized that times had changed, and what worked before wasn’t necessarily going to work in the future. This is not dissimilar to the choices IT leaders face today. In technology, as in sports, to keep a competitive edge, you have to continuously adapt to the ever-changing game. Looking at VMware’s recent announcements, I’m left wondering if they are giving their customers the state-of-the-art equipment they need to win.
I am fortunate to have the opportunity to discuss today’s infrastructure challenges with our customers and partners on a regular basis. Based on these conversations, two things stand out for me:
In such an environment, it’s no surprise that customers want their infrastructure investments to be able to adapt as the IT environment around them changes. They also want to be able to do things their way, and not be constrained by the limitations of a vendor’s solution. Continuing our discussion from my earlier post, this week I will explain why I believe Microsoft’s commitment to the Cloud OS vision results in a more comprehensive and future-proof set of infrastructure products than those offered by our competitors. Of course, there is no dearth of “cloud” vendors in the IT landscape, each claiming to solve ALL your IT challenges (I suspect they will also eradicate world hunger if you would only let them). You may be rightfully wondering – what separates Microsoft from the rest? I will provide two reasons:
The first is the uniqueness of our vision for your datacenter. To put it simply, with the Microsoft Cloud OS, you get one consistent platform for infrastructure, apps and data. And you get to decide where you want to extend this platform to – your datacenter, your hosting service provider and/or the Microsoft public cloud. In other words, you choose your cloud roadmap, and Microsoft will support you with a consistent experience no matter where you are.
Secondly (and as just as importantly), we are already bringing our vision to life, thanks to our ability to take the learnings from running some of the world’s largest datacenters and apply them to our infrastructure products. With System Center 2012 SP1, Windows Server 2012 and Windows Azure, Microsoft provides a unique set of capabilities to help customers provision and manage their infrastructure now, whether it is on-premises, in a Microsoft datacenter, or delivered by a hosting service provider. You can even choose a hybrid model that combines these options. Consider the following examples:
How does our competition stack up? Let’s look at VMware’s cloud portfolio. VMware customers that were evaluating their cloud roadmap were, until recently, faced with a myriad of confusing choices regarding public cloud and hybrid models. Should they use vFabric or Cloudfoundry.com? Cloudfoundry.org? SpringSource? Customers that were brave enough to dive in often had to deal with inconsistent functionality and experiences across these cloud services. To make things worse, recent announcements regarding the Pivotal Initiative have further muddied the waters. What will VMware do next? It’s hard to say, which doesn’t inspire too much confidence. These developments beg the question – is VMware still focused on building better wooden racquets?
You need not take my word for it. More and more customers are choosing Microsoft for their infrastructure precisely because of our consistent platform for public cloud, private cloud and hybrid models. A few examples are noted below:
Microsoft’s demonstrated commitment to provide consistent experiences to our customers, regardless of where they are on the cloud roadmap, makes an investment in Microsoft truly adaptable as the needs of your business change. As you evaluate your IT roadmap, I encourage you to ask yourselves – can the competition truly claim that?
Thank you for taking the time to read this post.
Good info