Network Computing is part of the Informa Tech Division of Informa PLC

This site is operated by a business or businesses owned by Informa PLC and all copyright resides with them. Informa PLC's registered office is 5 Howick Place, London SW1P 1WG. Registered in England and Wales. Number 8860726.

VMware Gets All Free & Easy: Page 2 of 3

”It’s a good move for them,” he said. “It’s not really hurting them too much revenue-wise -- most people are paying for their Virtual Infrastructure tiers of products anyway.”

VMware, unsurprisingly, played down the suggestion that this was a defensive move when the vendor spoke to Byte and Switch earlier today.

“This is really a continuation of a long-term strategy for us of trying to make virtualization available everywhere,” said John Gilmartin, the vendor’s senior product marketing manager. “In 2006 we had a product that we called GSX Server, that we turned into a free product called ESX Server.”

The exec added that this week’s ESXi announcement, which was first discussed on the vendor’s Q2 earnings call last week, is designed to get new virtualization users up and running.

”It’s really part of that strategy of trying to make virtualization pervasive and ubiquitous,” says Gilmartin, but he concedes that the vendor is playing in a “competitive” market. “We’re going to always pay close attention to our customers and market conditions.”