Tucci

EMC is betting that its VMware virtualisation platform will ride a strong wave of hybrid cloud deployments to drive robust business growth in 2011.

Joe Tucci, EMC's CEO and chairman, repeatedly emphasised the company's positioning in cloud computing while an analyst briefing in Boston on February 8. Since EMC's last analyst event in 2009, cloud computing has evolved from being just a buzzword everyone was using to become the at once "big game-changing" innovation that will make enterprises more nimble and efficient, he said.

The industry will be immune to this disruption

"No segment of the industry will be immune to this disruption," he said. EMC "recognised the possibility early" and realigned the business to meet anticipated customer demand, he said. "Looking back, we got it right," he said.

Companies are on a "journey to the cloud", with the hybrid cloud as the eventual goal, said Tucci. Companies virtualise tier 2 and tier 3 applications in the first phase and their mission-critical applications in the second phase of the cloud journey, he said. IT as a service will be the last phase, freeing up companies to shift IT spending toward new innovation instead of maintaining current infrastructure, he said.

EMC has identified several "megatrends" within IT and communications, just as the popularity of mobile devices and mass connectivity, the shift toward virtualisation and the explosion of information and data, he said. These trends are driving tremendous growth in the data storage industry as companies search for efficient ways to store and access "big data," he said.

The big data world

EMC has made "big bets in the big data world," Tucci said. Along with its virtual storage capabilities, EMC will be moving aggressively into the low-end storage space with new products, Gelsinger said. EMC will as well rely on its $225 billion Isilon acquisition to strengthen scalable network-attached storage business, he said.

There is a tipping point in IT and converged infrastructure is expected to be the fastest growing segment in IT infrastructure, said Gelsinger. EMC is aligning its business model to make getting to the cloud easier for clients, he said.

There is even room for virtualisation in mobile devices, Maritz said, referring to Tucci's megatrend about mobile devices in the workplace. Employees often use their personal devices to access corporate resources. However their applications and personal data should not be IT's business, he said. VMware is working on a project to create a separate "island" within the device that's "owned and controlled by IT" and separated from other applications, he said.

EMC expects IT spending to grow five percent to seven percent in 2011, Tucci said. David Goulden, EMC's executive vice president and CFO, noted that most analysts are predicting the high end of the range. Gartner is predicting 6.6 percent growth in IT spending, according to Goulden. The bulk of IT spending will focus on server virtualisation, security, cloud computing, Windows 7 migration and desktop virtualisation, Tucci said.