VMware Buys CloudVolumes, Which Divorces Application from OS

VMware has bought CloudVolumes, a startup whose software makes an application independent from the underlying operating system deployed on a virtual machine. The idea is to abstract all underlying infrastructure, including the OS, to enable the application to be moved from one environment to another instantaneously.

While CloudVolumes works for deploying applications on servers, for VMware, the move is aimed primarily at bulking up its desktop virtualization product portfolio collectively called Horizon. Sumit Dhawan, senior vice president and general manager of desktop products and end-user computing at VMware, said combination of CloudVolumes and Horizon would enable clients to build real-time application delivery systems.

Such a system can allow a company to manage all applications centrally, including availability and updates. It also enables an IT admin to deploy an application to virtualized environments on desktops, servers or in the cloud.

“Customers are looking to modernize their existing Windows application delivery architecture to be more like mobile IT,” Dhawan said.

VMware did not disclose the acquisition price.

Essentially, CloudVolumes splits the elements needed to deploy an application into multiple buckets (it calls them “application management containers”): middleware, applications and settings in one; configuration licenses, data and files in the other. The former sits on shared volumes and the latter on a unique volume for each application.

CloudVolumes actually disaggregates the software from the operating system running on a VM. With components of the application stack organized into different volumes, the volumes can be quickly attached or detached, making it easy to move them between different environments instantaneously.