The VMware/EMC announcement of the creation of a jointly owned Cloud Services business under the Virtustream Inc., brand and incorporating VMware vCloud Air has answered one question – what the EMC Federation will do about its multiple public cloud businesses. However, writes Wikibon.com Cloud Analyst Brian Gracely, it also leaves a list of important questions unanswered.

One of them is just how Virtustream Cloud and vCloud Air will be combined. Virtustream runs on xStream, while vCloud Air runs on a highly customized version of vCloud Director. The two technologies are largely incompatible, and neither at this time can support multiple data center availability zones.

Another is how the new Virtustream, Inc. will address the developer market, which is a major strength of both Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure. Neither Virtustream nor vCloud Air have a native developer platform-as-a-service (PaaS).

Virtustream built its cloud business largely on ports of SAP SE applications and SAP Hana. These have both long sales cycles and complex technical issues, and the company has a services arm with deep knowledge in SAP. But is that enough to create a viable cloud business? If not, what other opportunities will the new joint venture target in a highly competitive market with many  larger players?

The impending sale of the EMC Federation to Dell Inc. also raises another important question. Dell’s strategy so far has been not to build its own public cloud but rather to sell hardware and services to several cloud service providers, most notably Microsoft.

Dell and Microsoft have a strong partnership on multiple levels. Dell underlined that relationship at DellWorld 2015 last month, where Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella appeared on stage with CEO Michael Dell at the climax of the opening day general session (see video below). On the EMC acquisition call with analysts, Gracely writes, Dell reiterated his company’s commitment to open solutions and specifically said that future Dell cloud solutions would not be limited to using the VMware hypervisor. Exactly how Dell will incorporate Virtustream remains an open question.

Gracely recommends that enterprise customers watch as Virtustream evolves and suggests that its expertise in service-level agreements and security for mission-critical applications may play crucial roles in a multi-cloud strategy.

Image courtesy Virtustream Inc.