The majority of IT professionals consistently report they are happy with their knowledge of server virtualisation. They are comfortable with their understanding of where solutions are well suited in their evolving server architecture and perhaps more importantly, they also know which business use cases make sense in their organisations.

To date, server virtualisation has been most widely deployed in server consolidation scenarios where economic and operational benefits are often to be found.

This report summarises the results of an IT practitioner study completed in December 2010. Based on this input, we examine the views and adoption experiences of IT professionals and look at the state of play today with respect to the virtualisation of the server.

We note that significant numbers of organisations are currently undertaking or considering server consolidation projects, and that one of the most frequently asked questions at the moment is what’s involved in scaling up deployments. Real world experience is highlighting important areas that need to be addressed to allow wider adoption to be undertaken, most notably in the areas of management and software licensing.