News

Nutanix Hybrid Cloud Offering on AWS Targets VMware Users

• By David Ramel
• 11/07/2024

Nutanix announced a new hybrid cloud offering parked on AWS that can help users extend their on-premises Nutanix environments to the cloud, offering perks to other users possibly disgruntled by the ongoing Broadcom/VMware tumult.

Nutanix characterized the new solution as extending its partnership with the cloud giant, introducing Nutanix Cloud Clusters (NC2) on AWS, a hybrid cloud solution that enables organizations to seamlessly extend their on-premises Nutanix environments to AWS without requiring application refactoring. This integration allows users to operate applications across both on-premises and AWS environments as a single cloud, leveraging AWS services such as databases, Amazon S3, and advanced AI/ML capabilities.

Nutanix offered these highlights of the solution:

• Faster, low-risk app migrations. Move workloads quickly and predictably with the Nutanix Move migration tool, without costly application refactoring and, at the same time, minimize migration risks with bi-directional portability.
• Effortless scale and flexibility. Drive IT automation across the entire hybrid cloud stack, on-premises and in the cloud leveraging the elasticity of AWS to manage expected and unexpected capacity demands.
• Increase cloud efficiency. Increase cloud resource efficiency to reduce cloud costs through use of bare-metal platforms in AWS with a unified control plane, consistent automation mechanisms and lifecycle management for virtual machines. Simplify procurement by using AWS Marketplace for all your Nutanix software licensing needs.

This move also furthers Nutanix's position as a viable alternative to VMware amid Broadcom's acquisition and potential customer uncertainty. It's not alone in that regard, as many other vendors have taken advantage of customer unrest following Broadcom's acquisition of VMware, primarily surrounding new licensing terms (see "Broadcom Announces Changes amid VMware Brouhaha, Critics Aren't Buying It" and "Another Firm Woos Disgruntled VMware Customers to Migrate to Cloud").

In both a blog post and a news release, Nutanix today wooed VMware users, announcing AWS and its own promotional credits designed to reduce the costs of migrating their workloads.

AWS will offer promotional credits via the AWS VMware Migration Accelerator to help customers reduce costs when migrating VMware on AWS workloads to Nutanix Cloud Clusters (NC2) on AWS, covering AWS bare-metal services essential for NC2 operations. Specifically, that accelerator lets VMware Cloud on AWS customers earn AWS promotional credits for migrating virtual machines (VMs) to Amazon EC2 up until the end of this year, varying depending on how many VMs get migrated.

Nutanix also announced its own VMware Cloud to Nutanix on AWS Promotion. "Eligible VMC customers migrating to NC2 on AWS can receive one year of free Nutanix licensing, along with NC2 deployment and migration services and access to white-glove NC2 engineering services -- all designed to help mitigate risk and accelerate the migration to hybrid cloud," Nutanix said.

"Today's enterprises face growing uncertainty in their IT landscapes, but the partnership between Nutanix and AWS emerges as a strategic solution to enable more seamless migrations to Nutanix Cloud Clusters on AWS," Nutanix quoted Dave Pearson, research VP at IDC, as saying. "This collaboration aims to provide customers with the speed and agility needed to navigate today's dynamic business environment."