Most Internet technology departments today need to reduce their expenses and operate with better efficiency, even if managing multiple servers, administering an entire network on a daily basis while keeping the end users content. Those companies that have to control the costs of administration while reducing server sprawl see virtualization as an increasingly key business resource. In addition, there are new opportunities to leverage hardware for redundancy to increase overall system uptime. When a business consolidates physical systems within the data center by using a virtual infrastructure, companies may experience better utilization of their resources along with an increase in efficiency and a lower total cost of ownership (TCO).

Virtualization can change the total cost of ownership with faster provisioning and installation. As several virtual servers can operated on a single piece of hardware, the addition of another server won't require provisioning, eliminating the need to spend time on ordering, scoping and configuring a new one. In only several hours' time a new virtual server can be fully installed - much fasted than the two weeks or so estimated for installing a standard server.

The total cost of ownership is also affected by a reduced server administration workload. The administrator of a normal server will need to check the hardware status and server logs on a continual basis. VMware eliminates the majority of this kind of work, reducing the overall amount of time needed to properly support the server infrastructure. Time saved can be quite valuable to business, especially those which use a large number of servers.

Additionally, VMware can help lower downtime, as well as the costs of disaster planning and recovery. VMware is an excellent tool for businesses that must rely on the availability of data, as this new tool can manage risks while ensuring that the resources required are at the ready. During a regular data disaster scenario, long-running or unsuccessful data recovery campaigns are quite common. Often, equipment will need to be replaced, or repaired at least. Then the systems will need to be reconfigured and reinstalled.

These VMware systems can also help with quick recovery from a disaster, assisting in long-term business survival. Virtual servers can be backed up on another server. So, if the machine is damage, the server can be restored from a back up and put on to another machine having the necessary speed and power for it. That means that VMware can also reduce the costs of planning for a data disaster recovery, as these recovery sites can be virtualized to reduce the necessary capital expense. Both hardware agnosticism and the single-step file recovery featured by VMware can significantly lower the amount of time necessary to fully recover from a data disaster situation.

VMware also reduces the total cost of business server ownership through workload consolidation. As most of today's servers tend to be quite powerful but greatly underutilized, VMware has the ability to leverage available resources to allow multiple operating systems on just one single server. A normal server is running at about 15% efficiency in terms of processor utilization, and about 30% memory. With VMware, now companies are able to install new, virtual servers to existing hardware resources, instead of having to add new machines to the environment. This can help to significantly improve the return on your hardware investments. VMware is able to greatly reduce the overall cost of server ownership, reducing business risks - particularly when leveraged properly in a particular server environment.