Earlier this year, Nutanix Inc. executives went out of their way to emphasize the positive nature of the company’s relationship with Dell EMC. The integration of Nutanix software on Dell’s PowerEdge servers has been a benefit to both companies was the message in a conference call with analysts.

Fast forward to the Nutanix .NEXT EU event last week, and the discussion is still very much the same, despite speculation surrounding the competitive battle between VMware Inc. (part of Dell EMC) and Nutanix. “This is a relationship that is built to last. It requires a level of maturity for the business to turn off the noise and listen to the music. We’ve been able to do that,” said Sudheesh Nair (pictured, left), president of Nutanix.

Nair visited the set of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE’s mobile livestreaming studio, and spoke with host Stu Miniman (@stu) during the Nutanix.NEXT EU event in Nice, France. He was joined during the interview by Dan McConnell (pictured, right), vice president of the Converged Platform & Solutions Division at Dell EMC. They discussed Dell EMC’s plans for Intel’s new processors, data protection integration, and the continued evolution of the Dell and Nutanix partnership. (* Disclosure below.)

Nutanix will support Intel Skylake

One area of interest to both companies involves the expected integration of Intel’s Skylake processors with Dell EMC’s appliances and platforms. Last week, Nutanix announced Enterprise Cloud OS software support for Intel’s next-generation processors.

Dell EMC was not yet prepared to provide specifics on how Skylake processors will be integrated in its 14th generation servers. “Very soon you’ll hear some announcement around 14th-generation PowerEdge,” McConnell said.

The evolution of the two companies’ partnership will also likely be influenced by Nutanix’s move toward a more software-driven model. “We have teams of people who are focusing on integrating the platform and the software,” said McConnell, who described plans for tighter integration of data protection products with the Dell EMC XC Series.

At a VMworld conference in 2012, a former VMware executive famously declared that his company would not lose out to a “bookseller” (referring to Amazon Web Services, Inc.). But the competitive landscape is always changing and new partnerships emerge. “In the last VMworld, the CEOs of VMware and AWS were both hugging it out,” Nair said. “I fundamentally think that the relationships in the IT industry will no longer be black or white. It will always be shades of gray.”

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

Photo: SiliconANGLE