VMware May Be Microsoft’s Top Rival After Google
VMware May Be Microsoft’s Top Rival After Google – NYTimes.com
Microsoft’s No. 1 rival is a household name, Google. But a strong candidate for No. 2 is a company that is scarcely known outside the technology industry: VMware.
Jim Wilson/The New York Times
Paul Maritz, right, is chief executive of VMware and Tod Nielsen is chief operating officer. Both are former Microsoft executives.“VMware is definitely a threat,” said Gary Chen, an analyst at IDC, a research firm. “After Google, it is the company Microsoft fears most.”
Google and VMware pose a broadly similar challenge to Microsoft, by potentially undermining the dominance of its most lucrative products, desktop software and operating systems. While Google represents the attack from above, VMware is the assault from beneath.
Google, the search giant, offers free advertising-supported software for e-mail, word processing, calendars and spreadsheets online, as alternatives to Microsoft’s popular Office products. For Web-based programs like these, it is the browser — not an operating system like Windows — that is the vital layer of software on the computer.
