VMware, Inc. has a lot to adjust to these days. With the ink still drying on EMC’s (VMware’s parent company) merger with Dell, Inc., no one knows for certain what kind of step-parent Dell will turn out to be. Will it allow VMware to keep its independence and play as liberally as ever in the ecosystem? Or will the company want to remake VMware in its own more staid, mainstream image?

These and other questions were explored by Stu Miniman (@stu) and Sam Kahane (@Sam_Kahane), cohosts of theCUBE, from the SiliconANGLE Media team, for a special VMworld 2016 preview. The conference, slated for August 29 to September 1 is one of the most buzzed-about annual tech events, and the Dell-EMC deal is lending extra suspense this year.

Miniman said he is watching the deal closely to see how it might influence the conversation at the conference. “By the time we get to VMworld, will it [the deal] be closed? Will it be almost closed? That’s going to be sorted out.”

Kahane noted VMware’s topsy-turvy year on the stock market. “A year ago the stock price was in the 80s. Then around January-February, it dropped all the way down to the 40s, started climbing up … and now it’s in the 70s,” he said, asking Miniman for his take on the situation.

Miniman said that the stock market doesn’t like uncertainty, and the deal with Dell has generated a lot of uncertainty around VMware’s direction.

Is VMware still #1?

“VMware is still the dominant player in server virtualization,” Miniman said, “but there’s definitely some people threatening — the Microsofts of the world and the cloud vendors.”

Many are watching to see how VMware deals with the competition and how Dell might assist.

Showtime at Mandalay Bay

Miniman said there will be a ton of announcements to look forward to at VMworld 2016.

“Usually, there’s a major release of vSphere [VMware’s cloud computing virtualization platform] that goes out, and that has a ripple effect as to everybody saying, ‘Hey, we support that, and here’s the awesome new thing that we do,’ he said.

Watch the entire VMworld 2016 preview video below, and be sure to watch SiliconANGLE and theCUBE’s coverage of the event live from August 9-10.

Photo by SiliconANGLE