See if you can name the major software vendor from whom analysts heard the following this week:

“Virtualization is our top priority.”

“Virtualization needs to be ubiquitous.”

“We will deliver cross-platform support that is standards-based and community extensible, with a partner ecosystem for non-M_ _ _ _ s _ _ _ applications.”

Give up?

Microsoft Management Summit 2008 was all about virtualization, including the admission that the company is late to jump on the bandwagon. How exactly did they finesse that? I quote: “We’re late.” Not clear enough? Several senior execs carried onto the podium their pink, foam, winged toy pigs.

Watch very closely for announcements from Redmond over the next several months. They’re not just joining the game; they’re preparing to throw down a serious challenge to the industry’s biggest players. Much of what was relayed to us is under NDA, but we can say that MS seems to, at least in our opinion, finally “get it.” Both our formal and informal conversations with MS executives lead us to believe that they now have a much deeper and more sophisticated understanding of enterprise customer problems and challenges. MS is busily working to convert this new-found wisdom into products aimed at IT optimization and reducing IT management load. A big part of this is, of course, virtualization. Microsoft’s entry into this market will have a substantial impact, and leave nasty welts on some competitors. We’ll report more when we can…probably under the heading of “Surrender Dorothy” or something equally pithy.