We just enjoyed the General Session for Partner day 2009 and the message is ‘the virtualization business is still growing’, ‘2009 is all about client virtualization’ and ‘get up, register opportunities, close deal, dig deap’.

The keynote was presented to us by Paul Maritz, CEO of VMware. He stated that we can achieve change by two means, evolution and revolution and that evolution is the best as it tends to stay longer. VMware is the platform to achieve this evolution. He revealed a few public secrets, VMware vSphere, vShield zones and VMware vCenter Server Heartbeat. VMware vSphere is the new name for ESX but we knew, and blogged on that, already. VMware vShield zones a security initiative based on VMware Safe.  VMware vCenter Server Heartbeat is VMware’s new feature to create a high available vCenter Server, mostly for implementations where vCenter is still on a physical server.

The virtualization business is still growing
Research has show that only 5% of aal x86 servers are used for virtulization and this will grow to 17% in 2011. Research has also shown that Managed Services adds 6x drag to VMware software. What this means? For every $/€ spend on VMware software 6are spend on Managed Services and as that is the bussines we are in this is great news.

2009 is all about client virtualization
Everyone is working on server virtualization but client virtualization is a whole new area to explore. Only 1% of all client have been virtualized in 2008 and this will grow to 3-5% in 2011. Here lies a great opportunity moreso as VMware’s client suite will grow with a lot of new features which will convince fat client or Citrix die hards to go for VMware View in the future. Still think VMware View has no future? With coming 3D acceleration, high definition video support and offline desktops you can no long ignore that fat clients are about to be exterminated.

Get up, register opportunities, close deal, dig deap
As VMware has shown Partners have been massively registering new opportunities but the ammount of opportunities closed stays behind. So the message here is to score the deal that you register and ask VMware to help you during the sales cycle.

Do not let the economy be an excuse, let it be the driving force to boost your VMware sales.