During what was largely viewed as a cattle stampede to the public cloud, enterprise information technology managers suddenly came to the realization that they might be leaving something important behind: their data. This sudden moment of clarity changed the “public cloud or bust” movement into something that analysts at Wikibon Inc. have termed an evolution of the True Private Cloud, a mimicking of the public cloud on-premises. And one company that has emerged at the forefront of the new reality in public cloud vs. on-prem infrastructure is VMware Inc.

The new reality is that IT managers must bring computer operations to the data, wherever it may live. Despite a series of missteps over several years with its own vCloud Air offering, VMware has managed to emerge from the burning house of its own perilous business model in relatively excellent condition by following a “have-it-your-way” strategy. This came much more into focus during the company’s VMworld event in late-August: Still want the public cloud? Here’s our new partnership that’s just gone “live” on Amazon Web Services Inc. Worried about security in the hybrid cloud? We’ve got this product called AppDefense that can now be directly integrated into IBM’s analytics platform. How about bringing container-based architecture to the VMware operating environment? Check out our newly announced deal with Google Cloud using Kubernetes.

The trend here is hard to miss. VMware is forming partnerships with the Mount Rushmore of cloud providers and somehow managing to put itself in all of the tourist pictures. In fact, one of VMware’s top executives described it exactly this way while picturing how to build on the famous U.S. mountain.

“Think about the top four public clouds (AWS, Microsoft Azure, Google, IBM) as Mount Rushmore-type figures,” said Sanjay Poonen (pictured), chief operating officer of customer operations at VMware. “You need some concrete infrastructure that fills in all the holes between them. That’s VMware.”

Poonen paid a visit to theCUBE, SiliconANGLE’s mobile livestreaming studio, and spoke with co-hosts John Furrier (@furrier) and Dave Vellante (@dvellante) at the VMworld conference in Las Vegas, Nevada. They discussed the various elements of VMware’s cloud and data center initiatives, factors behind the company’s strengthening business picture, and how recent executive hires complement the strategic approach. (* Disclosure below.)

This week, theCUBE features Sanjay Poonen as our Guest of the Week.

Binding other platforms has value

The Mount Rushmore analogy from Poonen was echoed by others over the VMworld conference week but in different ways. Another VMware executive characterized his company as “cloud Switzerland,” helping customers choose whatever cloud platform they’d prefer without taking any particular side in the debate. Another likened NSX, VMware’s network virtualization and security platform, to “secret sauce,” while an Internation Data Corp. analyst called it “glue.” A technology that can bind with other platforms suddenly increases in value inside the interconnected world of cloud networking.

Still, there is no way to miss the message that the death of the data center is not near, and this has played nicely into VMware’s hand. Tapping the brakes on the drive into the public cloud means that enterprise operations are now thinking about accessing data in an on-prem model or at the edge.

“VMware is one of the most fundamental companies that had an incredible impact on the data center. And we are the de facto backbone of almost everybody’s data center,” Poonen said.

But is there a market for a company in the True Private Cloud? Analysts at Wikibon believe there is. An analysis published in May showed that the True Private Cloud category had doubled in revenue to $13 billion in 2016. VMware accounted for a six percent market share last year, third behind parent company Dell EMC and Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co.

Perhaps, even more telling has been VMware’s performance in just one year. When Dell purchased EMC in 2016, VMware was allowed to remain a public company. But the share price lost half its value to $43, and the company’s strategy involving vCloud Air (a hybrid cloud product), led by Chief Executive Officer Pat Gelsinger, was openly questioned.

Since then, Gelsinger is riding a wave of popularity as VMware’s stock has soared to a price well above $100 per share, nurtured by 33 percent operating margins and nearly $8 billion in annual revenue. The vCloud Air business was sold in April.

“We just want to keep growing, and the market will fairly value us over time,” Poonen said.

Rise of the hybrid cloud

The partnership between AWS and VMware underscores the rise of the hybrid cloud and is grounded in VMware’s Cloud Foundation software-defined data center project. It combines vSAN, NSX, vSphere and vCenter management products.

“We feel that we can be the leading player in the software-defined era,” Poonen explained. “We’re building this to be in all form factors.”

VMware has also been making several key additions to its management team over the past year, moves that appear to be strengthening both its business messaging and interest in catering to the full enterprise ecosystem. Dirk Hohndel, a longtime Intel veteran, was brought on board last year as VMware’s first chief open source officer. And Claire Dixon joined VMware’s executive team in July to lead the company’s global communications programs after a similar role at eBay.

“We’ve really focused on building a very strong team. We want to continue building a warrior-class strength in numbers,” Poonen stated. Will any of them end up on Mount Rushmore? Stay tuned.

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of VMworld 2017. (* Disclosure: TheCUBE is a paid media partner for VMworld 2017. Neither VMware Inc. nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE