Concern around VMware in the Dell EMC Merger
Transcript
hi it's Keith Townson from the CTO advisor.com with another CTO coffee chat I got a fresh cup of coffee and um ready to rip and roll and talk about one of my favorite topics and one of my favorite companies so before I uh rip into them a little bit uh VMware what I like about VMware first off let's talk about what I like about VMware and then we'll get into why I'm worried about VMware first what I like about VMware VMware has been a reliable reliable
partner in Enterprise it for a very long time they understand their customer extremely well and they understand some of the challenges that enterprises face as they look at the next three to five years and challenges such as uh Cloud native technology devops uh managing infrastructure in a new uh Cloud native application environment but while still developing and uh offering the same capabilities that the Enterprise has been riing upon for many many years I'm I'm really long on VMware strategy around Cloud native their strategy around uh
helping Enterprises continue to manage x86 virtualized infrastructures in a very very very reliable way so what's the what's the concern Bob darl of Barbara darl of fortune.com had a really interesting uh post Friday that talked about a 5% layoff to be announced the day of this recording I don't know if that's been the case yet I don't know if uh VMware has announced 900 layoffs and I made a comment on a tweet that basically went to the fact that if I was a vmw competitor that
I'd take advant of this the uncertainty whenever there's uncertainty in the market you take advantage of it that's what competition does that's kind of the American way for American companies which spawned a whole new set of conversations with VMware and EMC Federation employees around well what's how's VMware any different and Keith why would you recommend or make recommendations to your clients that would be any different than if Microsoft or Oracle or any other company announced re Orcs companies announced re Orcs all the time and my
response to that was basically most companies are not involved in a $67 billion acquisition by Dale the biggest Tech acquisition ever and with that comes complexity with you know I hate to say it it's no there with that comes uncertainty it comes from uncertainty in the market there's a reason why competitors are able to Spring upon that that uncertainty and take advantage to it to whatever extent they can it's questionable how much they can but I I wanted to share kind of my my view of
this from both a vmw customer perspective I am a vmw customer in my day job and as a industry pundit as a industry pundit this stuff is immensely interesting when you have a completely healthy company like VMware that's pressured to reduce I have to assume pressure to reduce that by 5% so that they can make their numbers so that the Dell acquisition can go through then as a customer who has to make decisions on who helps me move into this Cloud native environment do I look
towards a Microsoft and their azour platform do I look to a red head in their uh red stack do I look even towards a Oracle and when I'm thinking of mission critical uh opportunities so I'm uh uh sap shop do I look towards an oracle to help me move my sap instances to the cloud or to a cloud native infrastructure the reason why there's question is because traditionally EMC has taken a hands-off approach to managing VMware they've you know more or less let VMware play in
different areas such as storage your networking and and and taking the gloves off a little bit when it comes to vmw innovating I can't say that I trust Dale to do the same uh this whole 5% layoff thing has me as a customer not me as a CTO advisor questioning whether or not Dale is going to keep their grubby little hands off of VMware I mean the whole tracking stock issue them wanting to control VMware without getting up giving up any uh voting stock or voting
rights and being able to kind of control the story of VMware moving forward that to me as a customer that's an indicator of how I see uh Dale stewardship of uh of VMware VMware and Dale and uh EMC Federation employees can tell me whatever they want as a customer I have to be honest I'm skeptical I'm I'm just there's I've seen too many of these Enterprise it mergers uh go sideways and when the bill for debt comes due or there's pressure from some uh bu with
outsized uh with outsized Voice Within These companies strategies change and so that side of me has me questioning the VMware uh path going forward how does that affect my day-to-day to-day my recommendations to customers you know what the technology is still the technology I can talk about Oracle I can talk about redhead I can talk about Citrix all I want but vpar NSX to a lesser extent vsan I hear there's a killer announcement coming out soon but to a lesser extent vsan these are all pretty
much Cutting Edge technologies that are reliable uh I know them uh from a advisor perspective customers are comfortable with it from my day job we're comfortable with the platforms uh I don't see an immediate change so if I was in a buying decision today I wouldn't change that I would change my outlook for the next 3 to 5 years I know no one's planning for 5 years much in the Enterprise anymore but that's kind of the the cycles for the appreciation and we we we still
have to plan out for 5 years but I think uh I would tighten that up a bit I would avoid going into long-term agreements with uh EMC or VMware at this point I uh limit those two three years as uh as financially feasible uh and I just keep an eye out for the competition when the red when the guys from redhead Oracle citric newage uh broade Cisco lit goes on and on when those guys call you know what I might be a little bit more apt
to take the phone call now that I was let's say uh 4 months ago that's it for this episode of the CTO advisor coffee chat my coffee is getting cold so I'll get back to my day job if you guys haven't followed me on the twitters I'm at CTO advisor on the twitters and you can find me uh on the web the C2 advisor.com thanks
