As more companies bring hyper-converged infrastructure offerings to the table, there will be a separation into small, mid-market, and upper-end players — and who comes out on top may surprise you. If you’re expecting legacy giants to pull ahead and dwarf smaller players, think again.

Doron Kempel, chairman and CEO of SimpliVity Corp., said there are two axes on which the differentiation will take place: The first is the y-axis, which has to do with how far up market in terms of applications size a hyper-converged product can go; the other is the x-axis, which represents functionality.

Kempel told Stu Miniman, host of theCUBE, from the SiliconANGLE Media team, hyper-converged is no longer just a niche — it is on the agenda of every CIO in some form. We are now entering a phase of “understanding,” according to Kempel. “What I mean by ‘understanding’ is understanding that not all hyper-convergence offerings are created equal.”

He continued: “The next phase in the game — and this is a phase that SimpliVity has built itself toward — is the realization of segmentation within hyper-convergence.”

A young companies’ advantage

Kempel explained that being relatively new and small allows his company to be more nimble than established companies. Using VMware, Inc.’s history as an example, he said, “Wasn’t it clear to all these people [legacy companies] that this is big and they would do well to have a similar technology? Of course.”

So how come it took Microsoft, with vast resources and talent, to bring its spin to market? The answer, Kempel said, is: “These very large companies that we’ve all worked for, that we have tremendous respect for — it’s not that easy for them to close the gap on new technologies.”

Watch the complete video interview with Kempel below.

Photo by SiliconANGLE