Virtualization is no longer a one‑horse town. Many enterprises now run VMware vSphere in one data center, Hyper‑V or Citrix in another, test Red Hat or KVM in the lab, and evaluate Platform9 for a VMware exit strategy. This is on top of trying to keep SLAs steady and costs sane. The risk is obvious: every hypervisor stack typically wants its own storage island, its own tuning, and its own backup and DR targets.
Tintri VMstore was built for pattern interruption. Because it is hypervisor‑agnostic at the storage layer, you can safely run and protect workloads across VMware vSphere, Platform9, Microsoft Hyper‑V, Citrix Hypervisor, and Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization on the same workload‑aware platform. Instead of managing separate arrays and protection schemes per hypervisor, you standardize on a single data management foundation and let the compute layer evolve at its own pace.
One Storage Platform, Many Hypervisors:
Because VMstore thinks in workloads and not LUNs, you can point multiple hypervisors at it concurrently and still get the same per‑VM and workload visibility, QoS, snapshots, and analytics you have seen throughout this series.
- Common data services everywhere. Whichever hypervisor your workload is running on, it benefits from the same QoS, locking immutable snapshots, and per‑workload analytics.
- No more storage silos. Avoid buying, tuning, and babysitting a different array for each hypervisor; VMstore becomes the core data management plane for performance, protection, and capacity.
- Future‑proof flexibility. As you add or change hypervisors, the storage layer stays put. Keep your DR design, runbooks, and snapshot/recovery workflows, even as the compute layer evolves.
For customers planning a gradual move away from VMware, this means you can stand up a second hypervisor, start moving workloads, and keep using the same storage, protection policies, and monitoring as before, with no forklift and no dual toolsets.
Platform9 + Tintri: The Low‑Risk Path Off VMware
Once you have a hypervisor‑smart storage foundation, you can choose the right next platform rather than being forced into a single vendor’s roadmap. Platform9 is a natural fit here. Built by former VMware engineers, Platform9 Private Cloud Director delivers an enterprise‑grade virtualization and Kubernetes stack with a familiar experience for vSphere admins.
Paired with VMstore, Platform9 gives you:
- vSphere‑like operations. A vSphere‑like operational model with key VMware‑style capabilities—scheduling, HA‑like behavior, self‑service portals—while VMstore preserves your per‑VM snapshots, QoS, and analytics.
- SaaS‑managed control plane. A SaaS‑managed control plane from Platform9 plus VMstore’s autonomous data management, so your team spends less time patching and more time delivering platforms and services.
- Cloud‑smart footing. A cloud‑smart footing where VMs and containers run side by side on workload‑aware storage, spanning data centers and edge sites.
In real migrations, customers have used Platform9’s automated migration tools together with existing Tintri arrays to move tens of thousands of VMs off VMware in phases, retaining SLAs and protection while dramatically reducing licensing risk and cost. One VMware admin described provisioning and managing VMs on Platform9 “with zero training,” underscoring how smooth the transition can be when the underlying storage model does not change.
Why This Matters for VMware Exits and Beyond:
Broadcom’s licensing and packaging changes have made “wait and see” risky for many VMware estates. At the same time, a hard cutover to a single new platform—whether public cloud or another on‑prem hypervisor—can expose mission‑critical workloads to performance, availability, and compliance risks.
Hypervisor‑flexible storage with VMstore plus a partner like Platform9 gives you a controlled middle path:
- Change hypervisors without re‑architecting data protection. Locking immutable snapshots, per‑VM replication, and rapid recovery remain unchanged whether the workload runs on vSphere, Platform9, or another stack.
- Migrate in waves, not big‑bangs. VMstore’s workload‑level analytics and Scale‑Out let you identify which workloads move first, then use offloaded storage migration and Platform9 tools to relocate them with minimal disruption.
- Avoid new silos. As you introduce Platform9 or other hypervisors, you keep a single storage and protection platform instead of standing up parallel arrays “just for the new thing.”
Check out this Tintri + Platform9 Solution Brief to learn more
