The VMware Reset: Europe Reclaims Control of Its Cloud Stack

The VMware reset

A new research report sponsored by Veeam and published by Foundry reveals what many IT leaders across Europe already feel: the VMware era is changing fast.

Since Broadcom completed its acquisition of VMware in late 2023, satisfaction among VMware users has dropped sharply — 63% of organizations report lower satisfaction, and 56% plan to decrease their VMware usage within 12 months.
At the same time, license costs are expected to rise by an average of 47%.

This is not a small shift. It’s a once-in-a-decade reset moment in the virtualization market — and an opportunity for Europe to take back control of its cloud infrastructure.

The cost of complexity

For many enterprises, VMware was synonymous with virtualization.
But as licensing structures grow more complex and prices increase, many are realizing that their cloud strategy has become dependent on a single vendor’s commercial roadmap.

The research shows that migrating away from VMware is not without challenges:
on average, it takes 62 minutes per virtual machine to migrate, and 89% of organizations expect to need at least one full-time engineer dedicated to the transition.

Still, more than half of them are making the move — not just to save money, but to regain flexibility.

The european alternative

At whitesky.cloud, we believe this is the perfect time to rethink how private cloud should work in Europe.

Our technology was built from the ground up on open, proven components — Linux, KVM, Kubernetes, and WireGuard — integrated into one complete cloud platform.
It’s as-a-service, federated, and simple to use, while remaining fully under your control.

With whitesky, service providers and enterprises can deploy:

• cloudspaces for virtual machines, block storage and networks for CPU and GPU (AI ready) workloads
• objectspaces for scalable S3-compatible storage
• containerspaces for Kubernetes workloads
• integrated backup with restic, veeam, or snapshot director
• VDI environments with domain-joined Windows 11 desktops
• multi-tenant billing and metering for complete cost visibility
• federated operations across multiple european data centers

Everything runs on whitesky’s own cloud stack, designed and maintained in Europe by our engineering team — not repackaged from hyperscalers.

Built for simplicity and independence

Our goal is simple: make private cloud feel as seamless as the public cloud,
without giving up data sovereignty or transparency.

That means:

• no vendor lock-in — your workloads can run anywhere
• open APIs and a self-service portal for full automation
• predictable pricing that scales with your real usage
• integration-ready design for MSPs, Telecoms, SaaS providers, and governments

whitesky.cloud isn’t a cloud provider — we don’t own datacenters or servers. Instead, we engineer a complete, sovereign cloud platform stack that runs directly on the customer’s own hardware, in their own datacenter, or with their trusted MSP. This approach ensures full digital independence: your compute, your storage, your network — all under your governance, powered by a European-built platform.

From day one, the whitesky stack was designed as a true multi-tenant architecture, not an adaptation or an afterthought. This makes it ideal not only for private clouds, but also for building public or regional clouds, where many organizations securely share the same infrastructure without any overlap.

The multi-tenancy engine is deeply integrated with:

• automated usage-based billing
• fine-grained quota and cost control
• reseller and partner delegation
• built-in federation between independent locations

These capabilities allow MSPs, telecom operators, and governments to operate multiple cloud locations — each fully isolated yet seamlessly connected — while offering self-service access to their customers.

In other words: whitesky.cloud is the European cloud platform that empowers others to become cloud providers, enabling MSPs, telecom operators, and governments to offer public cloud and private cloud from the same unified stack.
Both environments work together seamlessly, allowing customers to run dedicated private resources while still benefiting from a shared public cloud operated by their trusted local provider — all with sovereignty, simplicity, and federation built directly into the technology.

The path forward

The Veeam study confirms what we see every day: organizations are ready to simplify.
They want resilient, sovereign infrastructure that can host virtual machines, containers, and data — without the complexity of legacy licensing.

If you’re among the 56% reconsidering VMware, now is the time to explore how whitesky.cloud can help you transition smoothly:

• migrate VMs using backup-based recovery or native import tools
• reuse existing storage and network hardware
• onboard through your local MSP or as a fully managed service

With whitesky.cloud, you can keep the freedom of the cloud while staying sovereign, secure, and sustainable.

Time to make the switch

Europe’s IT landscape is changing.
As large vendors consolidate and costs climb, the most forward-thinking organizations are building independence through open, federated technology.

That’s the vision behind whitesky.cloud —
a complete european cloud stack, as-a-service, simple yet powerful.

👉 discover whitesky.cloud

source: Veeam / Foundry “VMware Customers Weigh Alternatives” research report (2024)