Via VMBlog comes word of a new report from Research and Markets titled: “Vendor Landscape: Virtualization Competition Heats Up”:
“VMware retains its leadership position in this updated vendor landscape of virtualization software. However, the virtualization market has seen greatly increased competition in 2008. Microsoft has emerged as a legitimate competitor through its release of the Hyper-V hypervisor and Citrix has stormed onto the scene with its acquisition of XenSource.
This research note provides an overview of the x86 server virtualization landscape and addresses how the vendors meet the following key selection criteria:
-Vendor and product maturity.
-Advanced features and suitability for a utility infrastructure.
-Cost of licensing.
VMware remains in the leadership zone due to its market share and continued innovation toward comprehensive data center virtualization. However, where VMware was the only game in town a few short years ago, now the competition has become serious. Going into 2009, expect continued feature innovation and pressure on pricing. ”