Gartner Group analysis

The following material is taken intact from the VMSHARE append by Carl Forde (then of BC Systems, now at Beyond Software):

A recent Gartner Group report has some interesting things to say about VM and its future. Due to copyright restrictions, I can't reproduce the article here. I'll just quote the first paragraph and paraphrase some of the high points:

Everyone knows that VM is an unprofitable, dying operating system, that PR/SM and other hardware-partitioning schemes have ravaged the VM license base, that VM-based office systems are terribly expensive compared with newer LAN technologies, that VM has no significant growth potential, that VM code quality problems are pervasive, and that most customers are leaving VM. Curiously, everyone is quite wrong.
  1. If VM Endicott were a separate company, it would be one of the 10 largest in the world with revenues between $400-450 million.
  2. Fewer than 60 licenses have been lost to PR/SM in the last 3 years, while 100 new licenses have been sold to shops that outgrew PR/SM.
  3. A customer estimated a LAN based E-mail system would cost $350/user and $1/note. A VM based solution would cost $300/user and $.15/note.
  4. 20,000 licenses world wide expected to increase at 2%/year. Estimate 12,000 bootleg VM/SP sites in Eastern Europe and Asia.
  5. Expect VM code to attain 6 sigma in 1996. The culture in the Endicott lab has been fundamentally changed to one based on customer satisfaction.
  6. IBM is VM's largest customer. IBM estimated it would take 12 years to replace VM with alternative platforms and it would not save money.

See Gartner report: 93/04 GG-SMS Six VM Myths Exploded, SMS Products, P-507-1291, April 5, 1993, W. Malik

You also might find the this report interesting as well: 93/04 GG-SMS Facing the Client/Server Locomotive, SMS Key Issues, K-557-1288, April 5, 1993, A. Percy

Summary:

Clients committing to move from mainframes to client/server (a false distinction) need to reinspect why they had mainframes in the first place.

Gartner Group, I must mention, occasionally reverses themselves on this. They interpreted the moves of some mainframe clone competitors, plus IBM's not providing SYSPLEX for VM as implying IBM was dropping support for VM. IBM's Endicott Labs then had to go explain this all to Gartner; including the idea that perhaps VM needs SYSPLEX as much as a fish needs a bicycle. I admit I take Gartner Group pronouncements with a grain of salt.