VMworld 2012: VMware trumpets worldwide growth of cloud-based services

Virtualisation giant VMware has laid claim to having the world's largest cloud ecosystem, with services available in more than 28 countries across the globe.

Several years ago, the vendor announced that it had no plans to become a cloud provider, opting instead to partner up with telcos and other IT suppliers who could offer end users access to VMware-based cloud services.

Speaking to IT Pro in Barcelona at the company's annual VMworld conference, VMware vice president of cloud services, Mathew Lodge, said the approach was paying off well for the firm.

"We now have more than 160 clouds up [and running] now...in over 28 countries and there is no way we could have got to that scope and scale [if we had gone it alone]," explained Lodge.

We have clouds in 28 countries, which gives us the biggest cloud ecosystem in the world.

"In terms of geographical reach, that is the biggest cloud ecosystem in the world."

He also claimed the strategy had resulted in 169 per cent year-on-year rise in revenue during the first six months of 2012, as a direct result of it partnering with more cloud service providers.

"We are adding new partners, but that is only really part of the story as each one is selling more [cloud services], becoming more successful and cloud adoption is really picking up."

Particularly in the SMB market, he added, whereas enterprise users need slightly more convincing when it comes to cloud.

"There is very high value for SMBs to get someone else to manage their infrastructure, because they typically only have one or two staff," he said.

"Enterprises already have someone to monitor their infrastructure, so the question for them is often, I'm already doing this. If I give it over to someone else, how much value will this add?'"

Lodge also flagged some of the reasons why end users typically favour VMware-based clouds over those offered by industry giant Amazon Web Services (AWS), but credited the firm for "popularising" the notion of public clouds.

"The real difference customers see is that it is a lot easier to bring your existing applications along to VMware, and part of the reason for that is the way we have built vCloud to support the needs of old and newer applications," he said.

"Amazon really focused on brand new applications from the outset and, in the early days, it was very difficult to take an existing application to AWS, but they have since made it easier."