The Future of Virtualization: An Interview with SCALE Computing’s Jeff Ready

Virtualization is going through one of the biggest shakeups in decades. With Broadcom’s acquisition of VMware causing disruption across the industry, many IT leaders are searching for stable, innovative alternatives. I recently sat down with Jeff Ready, President and CMO of SCALE Computing, to talk about the state of virtualization, SCALE’s explosive growth, and what’s next after their acquisition by Acumera.


VMware Fallout: From Stability to Chaos

For years, VMware was the default choice for enterprise virtualization. But as Jeff explained, Broadcom’s changes to VMware’s licensing and support model have left many mid-market organizations scrambling.

  • Support for VMware vSphere 7 is ending faster than some customers realized.

  • Many MSPs and resellers have been shut out of VMware’s partner program entirely.

  • Customers feel betrayed after decades of stability.

While large global enterprises remain VMware’s focus, small and midsized businesses are left seeking alternatives. For Jeff, this has been both a challenge and an opportunity:

“All of a sudden the world has opened up and companies like SCALE can now get their time in the sun with products like HyperCore.”


SCALE’s Growth and Sweet Spot

SCALE Computing’s HyperCore platform has thrived in this environment. According to Jeff, every quarter has set a new record for demand. Their sweet spot remains:

  • Mid-market IT teams (2–15 people)

  • Organizations with a few hundred to a few thousand employees

  • Edge environments like retail, manufacturing, and transportation

At the edge, simplicity and resilience matter most. Think gas stations running video surveillance, credit card transactions, and pump-top advertising — all without on-site IT staff. HyperCore’s automation and reliability shine in these environments.


Acumera Acquisition: Building the “Good VMware”

One of the biggest changes since our last conversation is SCALE’s acquisition by Acumera, backed by Oaktree Capital. But Jeff was quick to clarify:

  • This isn’t a Broadcom-style takeover. SCALE and Acumera were roughly the same size, and the combination is about growth and synergy, not consolidation.

  • Acumera brings managed networking and security with their AccuVigil platform.

  • Their Reliant product extends into massive container orchestration for brands with thousands of sites, like Taco Bell.

Together, these capabilities position SCALE to become what Jeff calls the “good VMware” — a full-stack platform serving customers that VMware has left behind.


New Features: Veeam, Fleet Manager, and Zero-Touch

Since we last spoke, HyperCore has added major functionality:

  • Veeam Integration: HyperCore is now a supported hypervisor for Veeam backups. Migrating from VMware is as simple as restoring from your Veeam backup.

  • Fleet Manager: A cloud-based portal for managing single servers or thousands of nodes from anywhere.

  • Zero-Touch Provisioning: Preconfigure networking, storage, and VM templates before the hardware even ships — cutting deployment times drastically.

  • App Deployment & Storefront: Push applications across sites with a few clicks, making HyperCore feel more like an AWS Marketplace experience.

Jeff emphasized that SCALE aims for intentional simplicity — not every nerd knob, but all the core features most organizations need.


Community and the Road Ahead

Beyond technology, Jeff stressed the importance of building a real community around SCALE. VMware’s once-legendary VMworld and VMUG communities have withered away, leaving a gap.

SCALE’s new annual conference, Platform, aims to fill that void:

  • A mix of SCALE sessions and vendor-neutral tracks on networking, security, and infrastructure.

  • Panels and open forums where users share knowledge (sometimes answering each other’s questions before SCALE’s engineers even jump in).

  • A goal of becoming the next great IT community event, not just a vendor conference.

And for the homelabbers? Jeff confirmed that a community-supported HyperCore edition is in the works. For now, it’s available to resellers and partners, but expanding access to individuals is a personal project of his.


Final Thoughts

In a world where VMware is pulling up the ladder, SCALE Computing is doubling down on the mid-market and edge — with an emphasis on simplicity, resilience, and community.

Jeff summed it up well:

“We want to be the good version of VMware. That means powerful technology, yes — but also real relationships, support, and a thriving community.”

The future of virtualization may look very different than it did just a few years ago, but companies like SCALE are proving that disruption creates space for innovation.

Nutanix’s Big Shift: Disaggregated Storage Is (Finally) Here – But There’s a Catch

 

Fresh off the showroom floor at Nutanix .NEXT 2025 in Washington, D.C., the worst-kept secret in the virtualization world has finally been confirmed: Nutanix is officially embracing disaggregated storage by allowing select third-party storage vendors into its once tightly controlled ecosystem. And the first major player through the gates? Pure Storage.

This is a monumental change for Nutanix—an organization long known for its firm commitment to the Hyperconverged Infrastructure (HCI) model. But, as with all things in enterprise IT, the real story lies in the details. Let’s break it down.


From HCI-Only to Selective Openness

At this year’s .NEXT conference—Nutanix’s equivalent of VMware Explore or Microsoft Ignite—the company unveiled a major strategic pivot: official support for disaggregated storage in its virtualization stack. This is not the first time Nutanix has tested the waters. In fact, Dell PowerFlex previously received early (albeit limited) integration.

But this time, the spotlight is on Pure Storage as Nutanix’s premier partner in this new venture. The integration isn’t just a symbolic nod to open ecosystems—it’s a deliberate technical partnership focused on performance, modernization, and (we assume) market differentiation in a post-VMware world.


The Fine Print: Not All Pure Storage Arrays Are Welcome

Let’s not get too excited just yet.

At launch, only Pure Storage X and XL arrays are officially supported. That means if you’re running any of Pure’s C, E, or S series arrays, you’re out of luck. Despite being highly capable (and all-flash), these arrays are currently excluded from Nutanix’s compatibility list.

To make matters more complicated, the supported compute platforms are also limited. Only third-party vendors—Dell, HPE, Cisco, and Lenovo—can participate in this initial rollout. If you’re running Nutanix software on Nutanix’s own NX hardware, you won’t be able to use disaggregated Pure Storage arrays.

That’s right. Nutanix’s own servers are not supported for their own disaggregated storage solution. Bizarre? Definitely. Strategic? Probably. Beneficial to the customer? Not so much.


Why the Hardware Exclusion?

This decision left many (myself included) scratching their heads. Why exclude Nutanix-branded hardware from this groundbreaking architectural evolution?

The answer, based on conversations I had on-site, is murky at best. Some Nutanix employees hinted that support might come later. Others flat-out denied any plans to include NX hardware. My take? This is likely a move to create differentiation and offer partner vendors like Dell and HPE a reason to stick around.

Nutanix hardware is often sold at cost, with no real markup, meaning third-party vendors have a hard time competing on price. By limiting disaggregation to partner hardware, Nutanix may be giving those vendors an edge as a form of ecosystem appeasement.

But as a customer? It’s frustrating.


Let’s Talk Tech: NVMe over TCP Only

Nutanix’s disaggregated storage architecture is based entirely on NVMe over TCP—a fast, modern protocol that enables high-throughput, low-latency connectivity between storage arrays and compute nodes over standard IP networks.

There’s no iSCSI. No NFS. No Fibre Channel. Just NVMe/TCP.

From a performance standpoint, I get it. Nutanix wants to preserve the high IOPS expectations their customers are used to in a tightly integrated HCI environment. NVMe over TCP allows them to offload storage while still delivering near-local disk performance.

But it’s still a bold, potentially alienating decision. Not every shop needs that level of performance. Some customers may have perfectly good arrays that support iSCSI or NFS but are now effectively locked out unless they upgrade—often unnecessarily.


How It Works: A Whole New Storage Model

Let’s dive into the architecture.

Instead of traditional shared storage (like a big shared NFS mount that multiple hypervisors access), Nutanix is implementing something closer to VMware VVOLs. Each VM running on Nutanix’s AHV hypervisor gets its own dedicated virtual volume provisioned from the Pure Storage array.

These volumes are self-contained and follow the VM between hosts. That means you don’t have a single large pool of shared storage, but rather an architecture where each VM is its own unit of storage provisioning. This could have interesting implications for cloning, backup, and mobility.

It’s different. It’s modern. And for some use cases, it could be a huge win.


What About Dell PowerFlex?

Nutanix’s previous attempt at disaggregated storage came via Dell’s PowerFlex. But the architecture there was more of a hack: the compute nodes used their network HBAs to mount remote disks and trick AHV into thinking they were local.

That may change. Nutanix and Dell are reportedly working on evolving that approach into a native, direct integration similar to what Pure is doing now. However, as of today, the implementations are completely different.

So if you’re comparing vendors, don’t assume feature parity between PowerFlex and Pure Storage.


Who’s Next?

Nutanix stayed tight-lipped when I asked about future partners. But if you look at the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Storage, you can probably guess the most likely candidates—assuming those vendors support NVMe over TCP.

If I had to bet, we’ll see support for another major player before year’s end.


Final Thoughts: The Good, the Bad, and the Disappointing

Let’s start with the good.

Nutanix embracing disaggregated storage is a huge win for customers and a smart strategic move. In a world where VMware’s future feels uncertain, customers want flexibility, especially in how they source and scale their infrastructure. Nutanix is showing they’re willing to open the gates—at least a little.

Now, the not-so-good.

The execution here feels too limited and too bespoke. Every integration appears to be a custom implementation, not a standard protocol-based solution like most virtualization vendors support now. That’s going to slow adoption, limit compatibility, and raise costs for both customers and partners.

And the NVMe-only approach? It alienates customers who don’t need bleeding-edge performance but still want the benefits of disaggregation. Not every workload is latency-sensitive. Give us iSCSI, NFS, or something standardized. Let the customer decide what performance level they need.

Lastly, the lack of support for Nutanix’s own hardware is just baffling. It creates artificial constraints in a space that should be all about choice and flexibility. I hope this changes—and soon.


In Summary

Nutanix’s move to support disaggregated storage is an important evolution in the virtualization market. It’s a signal that even the most HCI-focused vendors understand the value of freedom of infrastructure.

But if Nutanix really wants to compete in the new post-VMware world, they need to go further:

  • Open support for standard protocols
  • Remove hardware vendor lock-in
  • Treat disaggregation as a core feature, not a premium partnership

This is a great first step. But if Nutanix wants the future, they need to walk the walk.


Watch the Full Breakdown

👉 Check out our full video on this topic here: Watch on YouTube

🎥 Looking for more virtualization insights? Dive into our Virtualization Playlist for more deep dives, walkthroughs, and honest takes.

💬 Got thoughts? Drop them in the comments or come yell at me on Twitter (@2GuysTek). I want to hear from the IT pros, homelabbers, and engineers in the trenches.


Support the Channel

If you like the content we’re creating and want to help us keep the lights on:

Thanks for reading — and as always, stay nerdy!