VMware’s CEO Pat Gelsinger has taken it upon himself to deny rumors that he’s set to leave the company once Dell Inc. takes over its parent firm EMC Corp. in a $67 billion deal later this year.

Rumors of Gelsinger’s imminent departure were first published by channel publication CRN.com earlier this week, following the CEO’s non-appearance at last week’s EMC World 2016 conference. CRN quoted “several anonymous sources” in its report, and claimed that senior executives inside Dell and EMC were unhappy with his “uncooperative” nature. In particular, Dell and EMC officials were said to be unhappy with the way Gelsinger rejected plans to combine VMware’s vCloud Air with Virtustream to create a joint cloud venture once the Dell/EMC deal was done.

But speaking at the Jefferies Technology Conference earlier this week, Gelsinger squashed any notion (registration required) that he was looking to leave the company anytime soon.

“I categorically deny it, EMC categorically denies it, and Dell categorically denies it, so there is absolutely no merit or substance to the rumour whatsoever,” Gelsinger said. “My intention is to stay here and Michael’s [Dell] intention is that I stay here yesterday.”

Indeed, it seems that Gelsinger and Michael Dell had a good chuckle about the rumors when they first surfaced. The VMware boss told his audience that he was with Dell himself when he first learned of the rumors, and joked with him: “Is there something I don’t know?”

Gelsinger also addressed the recent rash of executive departures from VMware in recent months, saying that it was just a sign that many execs had reached new stages in their lives, and that they weren’t tired of VMware itself. He explained that some of the departed execs have teenage kids, while others were just looking for new horizons. Gelsinger also told his audience that the replacement execs were hungry and experienced, and said he felt the departures hadn’t left his team diminished in any way.

Gelsinger put on an optimistic face throughout his talk, claiming that VMware is in great health and that its forging deeper and broader engagements with its customers thanks to its new software-defined data center offerings. Those customers who’ve bought into VMware’s vision generally end up signing long-term support contracts with the company that makes it very, very difficult for them to just walk away.

“I don’t think they’ll take us out for 30 years,” Gelsinger said.

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