Microsoft Gains Ground in Virtualization
    Lasting fame is rare in our YouTube culture. Gone are the days when 
Jaws 
  or 
Star Wars would dominate at the box office for months. Movies come 
  and go, make millions and then fade off into cultural oblivion. 
TV, once the home of massively popular sitcoms that nearly everybody seemed 
  to watch, is now one bad reality show after another. The "characters" 
  quickly fade from memory. Music? Well, we wouldn't know much about that here 
  at RCPU, but it strikes us that today's stars will probably only be famous tomorrow 
  if their lives go completely off the rails.
And so it goes, albeit much more slowly, with technology. Hype about one category 
  of technology or another comes and goes, ebbs and flows, and one red-hot trend 
  eventually gives way to another. If this week's news is any indication, it's 
  virtualization that's coming off the boil just a little bit, downgrading as 
  a market from red-hot 
  to simply growing. 
Yes, we know. The economy plays a role in the speed of market growth, but we 
  suspect that there are other factors at work here. For one thing, virtualization 
  isn't a novelty anymore, and there's bound to be a bit of market saturation 
  now that lots of companies have gone from craving it to using it. That's normal. 
  Plus, we speculate, a few unforeseen concerns -- security 
  comes immediately to mind -- might be dampening enthusiasm for the technology 
  just a bit. 
What's not slowing, though, is Microsoft's push into the space. The same IDC 
  report that noted virtualization's slowdown also pointed out Microsoft's gains 
  in market share in the space with Hyper-V. Apparently Microsoft's, um, aggressive 
  pricing strategy (better known as under-pricing VMware or giving stuff away 
  for free) is working, at least to some extent -- which should be little surprise, 
  as Microsoft has almost always had success undercutting competitor's prices 
  in new markets.
And, let's be clear -- virtualization is still a hot technology; Gartner even 
  says that it'll be the hottest 
  of all in 2009. But it's not quite as red-hot as it has been for a couple 
  of years. So we're not burying virtualization here by any means -- we're only 
  saying that it seems to be going from, say, box-office smash to top DVD seller. 
  Either way, there's still money to be made. And it's still better than reality 
  TV.
What's your take on Microsoft's presence in virtualization? Are you making 
  money off of it? Sound off at [email protected].
 
	
Posted by Lee Pender on October 21, 2008