Simon Crosby - the Citrix CTO said in a Search Storage article - http://searchstorage.techtarget.com.au/contents/25176-Open-source-hypervisors-pose-challenge-to-VMware

"Another difference, according to Crosby, is that Virtual Iron's raw disk access method is block-based; XenServer can offer either 'file-backed' or 'block-backed' access. 'Because we own the hypervisor, we can do much more integration and development around it—Virtual Iron is just a consumer of it,' he said."

Wow. First - that is a false and ridiculous statement. We have been a substantial contributor to the Xen project and not just a consumer. Virtual Iron was the first Xen provider to ship 32 & 64-bit OS support, first Xen provider to ship LiveMigration, etc.

The market is in for a rude awakening with Citrix in regards to server virtualization. They don't have a viable server virtualization product. Instead they have cobbled together solutions from the ecosystem to make up for their deficiencies but it is impractical, expensive and adds complexity. They should stick to desktop - which is where they are strong.

Any discussions around file systems is just posturing on his part- of course we could integrate with a file system if it made sense to our market. I have spent years in the storage and file system arena and know that space extremely well and he is speaking out of school.

But that isn't even the biggest issue with Simon's statement. The Xen open source project is exactly that - an open source project. Citrix doesn't own the Xen hypervisor - the entire community does.

It is appalling that Simon would say what he did - it is irresponsible, false and antithetical to the whole open source philosophy.

We see the availability of Microsoft Hyper-V and System Center Virtual Machine Manager (SCVMM) as an important milestone in virtualization. But it really isn't going to shift the market any time soon.

Everyone has been waiting for Microsoft to come into the market in order to bring true competition to VMware. However, this is not going to happen for some time to come. How long? It may never happen. Don't get me wrong - Microsoft will challenge VMware on some level - but not in any real way for years - especially in large Enterprises. In that time VMware will continue to innovate, acquire new companies/products and increase their installed base.

There is speculation that Microsoft will dominate the SME virtualization market - the same that Virtual Iron is already selling successfully into. We know that Microsoft will do well in the SME but again it will be over time. There is a big market for Virtual Iron and that will be true for years to come. We've been shipping product since 2006 and have a proven track record and mature solution. Microsoft has a long way to go with their product. It isn't just an issue of features (which they lack) but of implementing a virtual center platform that can manage the virtual infrastructure reliably. That is an extremely important point. This is the challenge for them and Microsoft is just at the threshold of this journey.

Therefore the reality is that everything and nothing changes with the coming of Microsoft Hyper-V and SCVMM.

Nothing changes because Microsoft doesn't have a relevant product yet. Multiple industry analysts believe that Microsoft is 18 months with having a true server virtualization solution. In that time a lot will happen.

Everything changes because the Microsoft machine is rolling forward. And when a giant moves everyone pays attention.

As Microsoft educates the market with a rumored $300 Million in marketing funds dedicated to Hyper-V and SCVMM - and fail to deliver true server virtualization - Virtual Iron will leverage this opportunity to provide our proven solution. And while Microsoft stumbles through a 1.0 product and 2.0 and, and... Virtual Iron will continue to innovate and grow.