Finding the Parallels path

...virtualisation is not very robust and does not have a lot of tools, is pretty good at providing service capabilities.

So it has capabilities such as migration, management, partitioning and isolation of workloads onto a single server. Now, because it is so good, it can take market share out of operating systems such as Windows and Linux.

So our vision is quite different from what we have been doing, and that is to provide the same capabilities that people have in their own proprietary operating system, such as Windows, Linux or Mac OS.

So you will replace Windows in the future?
We are not replacing Windows, Linux or Mac OS. We are enhancing them. It is that enhancing part that will lead to automation. It is that capability to enhance the operating system and provide capabilities such as isolation and partitioning that is important.

It is also the same for VMware, but the problem for VMware is that they also provide their own platform. With the VMware platform, you don't need Windows and you don't need Linux. The long-term vision of VMware is for virtual appliances with a virtual infrastructure, and you won't need the other operating systems.

Do you see that happening? Do you see VMware replacing Windows and Linux?
They will not replace them across the board, no, but in some things, yes.

How exactly will that happen?
Windows is just an operating system and, in some cases, people are already replacing it.

Look at a kind of end-to-end scenario, where you don't need Windows at all. So you buy a computer from Dell and you put an appliance on it with somebody's application running on it with some other software — and that is the most dangerous scenario. Now there can be a number of applications where you just download VMware with applications.

Now are those applications appliances? It is just a matter of using a different word. They are applications today [but] they could be appliances. You can take a special interface library and would have a user library, a compiler library, a database application library. Now, in modern applications, 20 percent is probably from the vendor and 80 percent is made up of different libraries. Look at Linux. That is effectively just another set of libraries.

So where does that take your vision?
Our vision is that we don't really want to become a platform vendor. We don't think it would be very good because it is much more complex. If we stay down here and work in a limited way then we can get the channels, we can have our ecosystem. But if we go up there against Microsoft in a big way — well, you can't win, because Microsoft has the assets.

So you don't think VMware is challenging Microsoft in operating systems, its core ground?
If it stays where it is then it is not challenging them. Microsoft has all the channels and it has tens of billions of dollars in revenue, and that is a huge lever. I don't think it is possible for VMware to win long term.

So VMware would do well if it stays away?
VMware is trying to say it does not compete with Microsoft. But the problem is that, long term, one of them has to win and the other has to lose.

At the same time, VMware does not want to become a Bios company. Every computer runs a Bios. A Bios runs in every city, in every notebook, but nobody makes any money. To make money you need to control the API because that controls all the software and all the hardware and anything else. Now VMware says it doesn't compete, and that is easy to say because it doesn't have the product right now — but it will soon.

When EMC was in the market for a virtualisation company (before it settled on VMware) did it talk to you about a possible purchase?
All I can tell you is that everybody talks to us. We are an interesting company.