VMware aims to merge private and public clouds

"Some of their early presentations on public cloud were a joke," Wolf says. "Public cloud sounds good on paper but there are many compliance and security issues. ... VMware is actively engaged on those issues, and they have to be."

VMware on Tuesday also provided an update on its bare-metal hypervisor, which is due out the second half of this year. VMware CVP (Client Virtualization Platform), which was demonstrated last fall, is being optimized for Intel vPro, a technology for PCs that enhances security, manageability and remote maintenance. The partnership is not exclusive, so VMware could potentially make a similar announcement with AMD at some point.