Nutanix stops being so opinionated about where data must dwell

Shifts data services to containers and goes back to the future with Pure Storage tie-in

Next Nutanix is moving beyond its hyperconverged roots by creating containerized versions of its data services and more external storage options, in ways that make it a better target for those migrating away from VMware.

The hyperconverged upstart has always had a small dichotomy in its approach, in the form of an insistence that its own software-defined storage was non-negotiable even as it had no opinion about which hypervisor or other infrastructure its customers should use.

That stance softened last year when Nutanix made it possible to use Dell's PowerFlex storage boxes with its own stack.

At its Next conference in Washington DC today, Nutanix again offered its customers more storage options.

One is the chance to run its data services – replication, data recovery and snapshots – in containers, outside the Nutanix platform and on a container runtime instead of under a hypervisor on its own platform.

The shift reflects Nutanix's belief that the rise and rise of containers means data is now distributed across more applications, runtimes, and types of infrastructure. Providing data services that can run everywhere but still provide unified management for data wherever it resides therefore fits Nutanix's mission of providing a hybrid cloud management platform that can go wherever workloads run. It may also help Nutanix to do better on the edge, as the containerized data services can also run on bare metal Linux – an environment the company thinks will become prevalent in edge devices.

The containerized data services are called "Cloud Native AOS" and currently are only available as a preview on Amazon Web Services' EKS service. Nutanix intends to bring it to more Kubernetes implementations in the future.

Another softening of Nutanix's storage stance is expressed in a tie-up with Pure Storage that means its Cloud Infrastructure Solution will become able to use Pure's FlashArrays as external storage.

Rival virtualization platforms have relied on external storage for decades, a requirement that was sometimes so tricky to implement that big vendors invented "converged infrastructure" to pre-integrate compute, storage, and a network to bind them together.

Hyperconverged infrastructure came along and did the same thing – but made it cheaper and less complex by placing storage in servers instead of proprietary arrays.

And here we are now in 2025 with Nutanix, the upstart champion of hyperconvergence, now linked to two of the main storage hardware players.

Omnissa adds Nutanix support

Also at Next, Omnissa - the former VMware end-user compute business spun out last year as an independent company – announced its Horizon virtual apps and desktops platform can now run under Nutanix's Acropolis hypervisor.

It's hard to imagine a more striking declaration of independence by Omnissa, or a more satisfying endorsement for Nutanix.

The Pure tie-up is said to "deliver a customer experience uniquely designed for high-demand data workloads, including AI."

Which is a fair enough reason to offer an option other than software-defined storage, as dedicated storage devices are built for speeds in ways that storage-centric servers may not be.

The partnership is also designed to make Nutanix a more attractive target for VMware refugees, who are often accustomed to working with external storage. Nutanix argues its licensing will work out cheaper than VMware's when users employ Pure's boxes. The company is prepared to discuss future pricing for this option, presumably because those contemplating a move away from VMware have recent experience with sudden licensing changes and are keen to avoid another round.

Another element of the tie-up brings Cisco into play, as the networking giant has teamed with Pure to add the option to run Nutanix on the jointly developed FlashStack validated designs.

Doing so deepens the Nutanix-Cisco relationship, forged when Switchzilla binned its own hyperconverged play and made Nutanix its preferred partner. ®