VMware and Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS) have announced VMware Cloudon AWS, an on-demand service which will enable customers to run applications across VMware vSphere-based private, public, and hybrid cloud environments.
Michael Warrilow, Research Director within Gartner's Infrastructure Software Team, believes that the announcement is a reaction to the impending launch of Azure Stack.Microsoft intends to release Azure Stack in 2017, which means VMware and AWS now have a shared competitor.
“VMware gets to market as cloud, when it isn’t. AWS gets to market as hybrid, when it isn’t,” says Michael Warrilow, Research Director within Gartner's Infrastructure Software Team.
The announcements of both parties leave Google isolated. “For Google, this does leave them isolated. However, they have a very busy 18 months ahead as they expand their Google Cloud data centres around the world,” noted Warrilow.
Delivered, sold, and supported by VMware as an on-demand, elastically scalable service, VMware Cloud on AWS will allow VMware customers to use their existing VMware software and tools to leverage AWS’s global footprint and breadth of services, including storage, databases, analytics and more.
Most enterprises rely on VMware to run applications in their vSphere-based private clouds, and often these same customers are also running applications on AWS. Increasingly, these customers have asked both companies to make it easier to run their existing on-premises environments alongside AWS using the VMware software and tools they’ve come to rely on.
VMware Cloud on AWS is powered by VMware Cloud Foundation, a unified SDDC platform that integrates VMware vSphere, VMware Virtual SANand NSXvirtualization technologies, and will provide access to the full range of AWS services, together with the functionality, elasticity, and security customers have come to expect from the AWS Cloud.
This new service represents a significant investment in engineering, operations, support, and sales resources from both companies. It will run on next-generation, elastic, bare metal AWS infrastructure. Customers will have the ability to purchase services through their existing VMware commercial agreement and use their existing VMware softwareinvestments to secure additional loyalty discounts for their VMware Cloud on AWS hybrid environment.
“VMware Cloud on AWS offers our customers the best of both worlds,” said Pat Gelsinger, CEO, VMware. “This new service will make it easier for customers to preserve their investment in existing applications and processes while taking advantage of the global footprint, advanced capabilities, and scale of the AWS public cloud.”
“Our customers continue to ask us to make it easier for them to run their existing datacenter investments alongside AWS,” said Andy Jassy, CEO, AWS. “Most enterprises are already virtualized using VMware, and now with VMware Cloud on AWS, for the first time, it will be easy for customers to operate a consistent and seamless hybrid IT environment using their existing VMware tools on AWS, and without having to purchase custom hardware, rewrite their applications, or modify their operating model.”
Available in mid-2017, VMware Cloud on AWS will be delivered, sold, and supported by VMware as an on-demand, elastically scalable service. Pricing will be made available closer to the general availability date.