Win, win, win. That is the mission in a market-driven society. No one really believes that it’s “not winning or losing, but how you play the game” that matters. Microsoft didn’t become the behemoth it is today by following the golden rule. That is certainly true of Oracle as well. They won because they were aggressive, opportunistic and didn’t play nice.

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In this society, we value leadership—and even dominance. But we also reject monopolies because there is no competition—no checks and balances—which typically leads to inferior products at inflated prices. I don’t think anyone can argue that VMware is fundamentally a monopoly in the virtualization space. Some estimate that Microsoft has 20-25% market share, but does it really count if you give your product away for free? For all intents and purposes, VMware owns nearly 100% of the market—if you use revenue as your measure.

VMware will continue to become bigger and bigger. It will seek to deliver new capabilities and products. It will look for new market opportunities. VMware doesn’t have modest goals—it will be aggressive, opportunistic and won’t play nice to achieve greatness. In fact, VMware wants to eclipse Microsoft and all that it has achieved. And VMware is well-positioned to make this happen.

VMware sits beneath the operating system and as such, it trumps it and is now first in line. And since it sits beneath the operating system, it automatically achieves what Microsoft never can: heterogeneity. Operating systems by their very nature are homogeneous (it’s like saying sugar is sweet) and therefore, you will always have a dividing line between Windows and Linux. But VMware is OS independent. It has been embraced by both Windows and Linux constituents. Right out of the gate, VMware has a bigger potential market than Microsoft by virtue of its universality.

All of the ecosystem partners will continue to help further VMware’s success because it is a symbiotic relationship—right now, everyone is making money. But in so doing, there is a big risk that over time, VMware will marginalize most, if not all, of its ecosystem partners.

VMware is in a position to deliver more and more functionality that will increasingly impact the very ecosystem that is complicit in making it successful. Since VMware today is fundamentally an infrastructure company, it will build concentric circles of capability from that point outward. That is why its proprietary file system is so important—it enables VMware to manage and control data. It gives VMware the keys to the kingdom and they know it. Microsoft never quite got this and still doesn’t today. In the meantime, VMware is in a position to create more software that will impact storage, backup and replication.

Many of the ecosystem partners – the server, storage, backup, data protection and operating system vendors – realize this to some degree. But what can they do? They have to play nice. Especially since they are making a boatload of money. So they go about their business and hedge their bets by supporting Microsoft and Citrix to create a balance of power. Microsoft gets a thumbs up because it’s– well – Microsoft. It doesn’t matter if its product isn’t available and will have major limitations for one, two, or maybe even three years. Citrix is invited to the party because it bought XenSource and even though it doesn’t have a fully functional product, it gets a pass because it is a big company and everyone assumes that it will get there. VMware is fully supportive of this, telling the world that it wants healthy competition. But everyone knows—even though they won’t say it out loud—that VMware wins in this scenario.

Where does Virtual Iron fit into this picture? Right now, we are the little guy in a land of giants. Virtual Iron has a really good product. We have thousands of production implementations (and rapidly growing) and a healthy and increasingly strong channel. However, in spite of this, we are inconsequential to the ecosystem I’ve been talking about. But guess what? It really doesn’t matter.

Where we win – where we matter – is with small and medium enterprises (SME). They have no loyalty to VMware. They are looking for a server virtualization solution that has all of the advanced capabilities and features they need to protect and manage their environments; they want an easy to use solution; and it has to be cost effective so that it doesn’t consume the lion’s share of their IT budget. That is what we bring to the table and it is really a no-brainer for them once they get their hands on it. We also matter to the channel. Many of our channel partners feel that VMware is oversaturated. Since everyone is selling it, they can’t make any money. And their SME customers can’t afford VMware, so they are looking for an alternative. We are that alternative.

Our mission is clear to us. Virtual Iron is driving as hard (and hopefully as smart) as we can to build leadership in server virtualization for the SME market. The writer Voltaire said that, “common sense is not so common” and this is very true in the server virtualization market. We will watch the giants, but our core focus is on building our business through the real customers that don’t give a damn about anything but getting their jobs done. Common sense.