Dell and VMware this week briefed reporters on our respective company’s virtualization strategies and some of the trends that customers are facing. Media coverage of the event is already appearing, including this piece from Jean Baptiste Su on his TechPulse 360 blog.
Joining Dell’s Paul Prince, Chief Technology Officer for Dell’s large enterprise business, and Steve Herrod, VMware’s CTO and senior vice president of the company’s research and development, were a number of customers that are actively using virtualization technologies in their infrastructures. Dell/VMware customers Cadence, Northwest National Gas, Trilliant and Frederick Memorial Healthcare have all implemented virtualization and are seeing the benefits. We have interviews with several of those customers that we plan to bring to you soon.
Following yesterday’s press briefing, we sat down with Paul and Steve after the event to get their thoughts on the interaction and what was discussed. Many of you may have followed us as we live-tweeted the event. If not, check out @bruceericatdell, @mattmcginnis, @dellservergeek, @kongy_dell for those tweets from yesterday afternoon.
Dell has a long history with VMware. In fact, our virtualization strategy is based on this long history – we’ve been a top partner and reseller for more than seven years. We’ve worked closely together to develop platforms that are built for virtualization and optimized for cloud computing applications. For instance, we were involved in the development of the vStorage API from the beginning; it’s a part of our shared vision. Last Spring, we unveiled vStorage-ready Dell EqualLogic virtualized SANs, meaning that we’ve enabled VMware virtual machines to take full advantage of the advanced intelligence of our storage arrays.
Take a look.