Can Microsoft With Hyper-V Topple VMWare?

My colleague Alex Lewis posted some interesting thoughts on Microsoft’s upcoming Hyper-V release in comparison to VMWare, the current market leader.

Market leader is a bit of an understatement at 85%. Everyone I know uses VMWare in some capacity. What makes Hyper-V a giant killer? It’s free. That carries a lot of weight in perceived uncertain economic times. It’s also a familiar interface and experience for for IT departments looking like any other Microsoft MMC or console.

Expect Microsoft to release decent code but they will innovate fast on next rev (that’s their playbook). Classic embrace and extend and in today’s market free software is the model. Nice move.

Alex writes the following.. “Microsoft’s Hyper-V (still in public beta/RC1) has some issues. The NetworkWorld Microsoft Subnet folks posted their thoughts yesterday. The most glaring is the inability to move VMs while active between hosts. Depending on your needs that may or may not be a deal breaker for you. Regardless I’m confident it’s something that will be addressed in a future release. Microsoft knows they need to equal/exceed VMWare’s offering to dominate the market. That said, Hyper-V is a LOT more friendly for Windows admins and it doesn’t require any of the core Linux skills that installing and tuning an ESX server does. The combination of easy to use and free has been Google’s trademark strategy. Microsoft may have taken a page from their book on this one and I think it’s very likely to succeed.”

Alex brings up a great point about MSFT killing Netscape in the browser market and IBM in email, however Microsoft hasn’t been perfect. Look at the mess they’ve made of Search. VMWare has such a head start they won’t just rollover at the sabre-rattling of Redmond.

A battle’s coming and we’ve got front row seats. VMWare what say you?

Update: Cnet is now just getting this story up. Ian Fried who wrote the Cnet post has good quotes from Microsoft.

Microsoft Corporate Vice President Bill Laing told me that he understands his company faces an uphill battle in trying to win over customers that have been using VMware and Xen, in some cases for many years.

“I think we’ll do best initially in ‘green field’ opportunities,” Laing said. “Small business, I think, is a completely green field. In the enterprise, where customers haven’t deployed (another virtualization technology), I think we’ll do well.”

Over time, Laing said he wants Microsoft find its way into data centers that already use VMware.

“I think it will take longer to rip and replace, but that’s certainly our ambition,” Laing said