Any price hike would worry consumers. When VMware updated the current pricing on their products, the company must also justify the new pricing scheme for its customers. Some are outraged users that are bursting into a mix of fury, fear and burden. The announcement was made soon after the company wowed the community with strong second quarter revenue performance, around the same time the new lineup of VMware Vsphere products were announced. VMware CEO Paul was quick to extinguish the fire and explains that users will be unaffected by the price increase.

“We believe that 95 percent of customers will see no change in their licensing costs. From our calculations, most customers will see no change and won’t be required to pay us more money,”

A Forbes article describes this update as an assault to one of its fiercest rivals, Microsoft. The latter was elated with the news of this updated pricing as they feel that they could use more than 75% savings (compared to VMware) as a strategy to lure customers into their yard. However, with the comprehensive array of products and efficient automation capabilities, it is not so easy to jump from VMware to another provider. Maritz knows that while adjustments in pricing have occurred, they will maintain industry leadership with the quality and scalability they offer. The 15-year Microsoft veteran says:

“The customer wants to just plug it in and have it work. We clearly have a pedigree (in virtualization) and, we have to build off that going forward…(but) we have strong and well-funded competitors in this field, specifically Microsoft. They have been predicting our death for five years. You can look at that and be complacent, or you can say they’re not giving up.” He added, “(VMware product) allows you to take all of your network resources and turn it into a giant automated computer.”

VMware has already reached an 84% adoption rate, and is still growing. But changes in pricing could ultimately hamper cloud computing growth, as we are talking about changes from few thousands of dollars to millions. But, this may not be the easy way out when you are within the virtualization sphere, where we seem to have only two choices: VMware and everyone else.  VMware is certainly out to squash the competition, making product integration a key factor in its appeal to keeping customers.  But VMware’s recent changes have also upped the ante when it comes to the virtualization industry, and now its’ everyone else’s turn to make their move.