It's Official - Microsoft to Support VMware

Yesterday evening Richard Jones and I received word from Microsoft that VMware had joined the Server Virtualization Validation Program (SVVP) and I expect an official announcement to come later today.

VMware has now signed on to the SVVP program. Microsoft is certainly excited to add VMware to the program, recognizing the value this provides to Microsoft customers. - Microsoft

This is a really big deal and both vendors should be congratulated on the work it took to make this happen. Once the news is made official, Microsoft applications and operating systems will be fully supported on VMware-based virtualization environments.

Other vendors should take note of Microsoft's support model, as Microsoft supports more virtualization platforms than any other vendor by a hefty margin. Here are the platforms now supported by Microsoft:

• Citrix (XenServer)
• Microsoft (Virtual Server 2005, Hyper-V)
• Novell (Xen)
• Sun (xVM Server)
• Virtual Iron
• VMware (ESX Server, ESXi)

Microsoft and VMware had been working diligently for several months on the completion of their support agreement and VMware's inclusion in the SVVP. We're just weeks away from Microsoft's Virtualization launch event and I'm expecting more good news to come out of Redmond at the launch event as well. Microsoft's official support of virtualization platforms from six different vendors should further accelerate virtualization adoptions throughout 2008 and into 2009.

Posted by: Chris Wolf