VMware: vSphere Pricing/Features Announced

VMware released more information to the public about its next-generation virtualization product today with the announcement of vSphere. The target is cloud computing and 100% virtualization will become the new mantra.

vSphere introduces much requested support for new operating systems as well. Starting with the release version of vSphere 4.0, the following OSes will be fully supported on VMware's platform:

Asianux, CentOS, Debian, FreeBSD, OS/2, Solaris, SCO OpenServer, SCO Unixware.

These come in addition to the already supported array of Windows, RedHat, Suse, DOS and Netware operating systems. This broadening of supported OSes extends the gulf between VMware and Xen/Hyper-V even further. As Cloud-OS is a tenant of VMware's future plans, the ability to support an extended array of operating systems is a requirement as customers export/import between private and public clouds.

[caption id="" align="alignright" width="250" caption="vSphere Essentials Editions"][/caption]

For the long-neglected SMB space, VMware now offers a vSphere Essentials to spur the growth of enterprise virtualization in that space. The new package comes in two editions: Essentials and Essentials Plus retailing at $995 and $2,995 respectively. Both packages come with vCenter Server and associated management licenses. The real value here for SMB's is the included licensing of three physical servers with up-to two processors and 12-cores each.

vSphere Essentials

Why is the Essentials offering so important to the SMB market? With the exception of vMotion technology, the Essentials editions offer small businesses the ability to consolidate up to 85 virtual machines for as little as $35/VM including server hardware (based on 2P, quad-core Opteron systems with 32GB RAM and 4:1 VM:core consolidation ratios).

Feature Essentials Essentials Plus ESXi or ESX (64-bit hardware) X X vStorage VMFS X X vStorage Thin Provisioning X X Four-way vSMP X X vCenter Server Agent X X vStorage API X X VMware Consolidated Backup X X vCenter Update Manager X X VMware HA X VMware Data Recovery X vCenter Server Essentials X X Suggested Retail Price $995 $2,995

We believe most SMBs will prove to have more aggressive utilizations than large enterprise averages. As a result, we expect fairly conservative consolidation ratios of 2:1 to 3:1 (per core) in vSphere Essentials integrations with only 3 servers.

Even so, Essentials delivers its solution for under $70/VM (30-40 VMs), and Essentials Plus comes in at $115/VM in a fully HA environment (no single host with more than 66% of design capacity). Likewise, one must consider the value of Update Manager, vCenter, vSMP, Thin Provisioning and VMware Consolidated Backup to SMB's moving forward.

The additional "IT muscle" leveraged with these options could create may "virtualization as a service" propositions for small integrators wishing to covert CAPEX into recurring revenues. We expect to see many offerings of this ilk cropping-up in the SMB space as wallets tighten and virtualization in-sourcing becomes more popular. In any case, either option presents an attractive value proposition for SMB's and the integrators/solution providers that serve them and vSphere is the leading platform to make it all happen.