For service providers, the VMware world has changed quickly. Customers are asking pointed questions about cost, contract lock in, and long term strategy. Many have already decided to move critical workloads to Nutanix and are looking for a partner that can guide them through the transition.
On paper this sounds like a major opportunity. In practice, delivering VMware-to-Nutanix services at scale is hard. Every client has different tools, fragmented data, and home grown processes. Migrations end up looking like one off projects instead of a consistent, margin friendly offering.
VirtualReady, built on the ReadyWorks platform, helps service providers break that pattern. It gives you a consistent way to discover, analyze, plan, and orchestrate VMware-to-Nutanix migrations so you can package them as repeatable services rather than bespoke consulting gigs.
This article looks at what it really means to productize a migration practice, the challenges that get in the way, and how VirtualReady helps you build a VMware-to-Nutanix playbook you can run again and again across your customer base.
The new reality for service providers after VMware changes
The impact of VMware pricing and licensing changes has not been limited to end customers. Service providers, MSPs, and GSIs feel it as well.
You are seeing:
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Customers who have already chosen Nutanix and need a migration partner.
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Customers who are still evaluating options but want to see a concrete plan and business case.
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Existing VMware managed services contracts that are now under pressure and may need to be restructured.
In each case, customers expect more than bodies on a project. They want a clear methodology, predictable timelines, visibility into risk, and a business outcome that leadership can sign off on.
That is difficult to deliver if your VMware-to-Nutanix services are built from scratch every time.
Why it is hard to productize VMware-to-Nutanix migrations
Most providers already have some combination of tools and processes for virtualization projects. The problem is not a lack of effort. The problem is variability.
Common issues look like this:
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Every client has a different tool stack. One relies on RVTools exports, another on a home grown CMDB, another on spreadsheets attached to tickets.
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Discovery and planning are manual. Consultants spend weeks reconciling VMware inventory with whatever systems of record the client uses.
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Dependencies and ownership are tribal knowledge. Application maps, maintenance windows, and wave approvals live in email chains and workshop notes.
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Reporting is ad hoc. Each project manager builds their own status deck and the story is hard to compare between clients.
All of this makes it difficult to sell a simple, repeatable VMware-to-Nutanix service. Behind the scenes, delivery feels like a series of custom projects that just happen to use some of the same tools.
To truly productize your practice, you need a consistent way to handle data, workflows, and reporting across clients, while still leaving room for each customer’s unique constraints.
What “productizing” a migration practice really means
When you talk about productizing a migration service, you are really talking about four things.
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A standard methodology.
A clear, named approach that moves customers through discovery, analysis, planning, execution, and post migration optimization. -
A reusable data model and playbook.
A consistent way to collect, normalize, and use data from VMware, Nutanix, and IT operations tools, plus a set of playbooks that define what happens at each phase. -
Repeatable deliverables.
A known set of outputs your customers receive, such as readiness assessments, wave plans, risk registers, and executive dashboards. -
Tooling that scales across customers.
A platform you can bring to each engagement to enforce the methodology, apply the playbook, and generate deliverables without reinventing the wheel.
VirtualReady, powered by ReadyWorks, is the tooling layer that makes those first three possible. It gives your teams a consistent way to execute the same VMware-to-Nutanix story with each client, while still adapting to the realities of their environment.
How VirtualReady supports service providers
VirtualReady is designed for VMware-to-Nutanix programs. For service providers, that translates into a set of concrete capabilities you can build into your offerings.
1. A unified data foundation across VMware, Nutanix, and IT systems
VirtualReady connects to VMware, Nutanix, and supporting tools, then enriches that technical view with business context from systems like ServiceNow.
For each client, you get a single, normalized picture of:
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VMware clusters, hosts, and VMs.
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Nutanix target capacity and design inputs.
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Applications, databases, and shared services that sit on top of those workloads.
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Owners, business units, locations, and other business attributes.
Instead of managing a different spreadsheet and script set for each customer, your teams use one platform that knows how to bring data together and keep it clean.
2. Standardized discovery and assessment playbooks
Because VirtualReady sits on a flexible automation platform, you can define standard playbooks for discovery and assessment that are reusable across customers.
Examples include:
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Connecting to VMware and pulling inventory on a defined schedule.
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Importing RVTools and Nutanix Collector outputs where direct connections are not possible.
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Reconciling inventory with CMDB or other systems of record.
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Flagging gaps, conflicts, and out of date records for follow up.
Your consultants do not have to rebuild this process every time. They select the appropriate playbook for that customer, adjust parameters where needed, and let VirtualReady handle the heavy lifting.
3. Automated stakeholder engagement at scale
Some of the most important data you need cannot be pulled from APIs. It lives with application owners, business stakeholders, and support teams.
VirtualReady helps you standardize how you gather and track that information. You can:
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Send targeted requests for maintenance windows, owner confirmation, or dependency validation.
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Drive approval workflows for proposed migration waves.
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Capture responses in a structured way and tie them directly to workloads and services.
For service providers, this consistency matters. It lets you show customers a clear, repeatable way you will engage their teams, and it prevents your consultants from getting bogged down in manual follow up.
4. Reusable analytics for readiness and wave planning
Every migration program needs to answer the same core questions:
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Which workloads are ready to move now.
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Which need remediation first.
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Which represent higher risk and need special handling.
VirtualReady uses the unified data model to drive readiness scoring and wave planning in a consistent way. You can build standard scoring models that consider factors like OS posture, dependencies, business criticality, and change windows, then apply them across clients.
Your teams stop building one off Excel models for every engagement and start working from a shared, tested approach.
5. Consistent reporting and customer facing deliverables
A key part of a productized service is what the customer sees.
With VirtualReady and ReadyWorks you can:
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Generate standardized readiness assessments that show scope, risk, and recommended sequencing.
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Present a consistent wave plan format that customers learn to recognize from engagement to engagement.
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Provide dashboards that track progress, risk, and issues throughout execution.
This allows you to position your VMware-to-Nutanix services not just as “we will move your workloads” but as “we will deliver a structured, transparent program with defined deliverables at each stage”.
Turning VirtualReady into a VMware-to-Nutanix “migration-as-a-service” package
To make this more concrete, imagine building a named offering such as “VMware to Nutanix Migration Accelerator” powered by VirtualReady.
Here is what that could look like in practice.
Phase 1: Structured assessment
Scope: 4 to 8 weeks, depending on environment size.
Activities:
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Connect VirtualReady to VMware and import any existing inventory exports.
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Reconcile with CMDB and application catalogs.
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Launch application owner outreach campaigns for key services.
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Produce a standardized readiness assessment and high level wave design.
Deliverables:
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Estate summary and data quality score.
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Risk and dependency heat map.
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Draft migration waves aligned to business units or services.
Phase 2: Detailed design and wave planning
Scope: 4 to 6 weeks.
Activities:
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Refine wave plans based on stakeholder feedback and additional data.
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Use VirtualReady analytics to model different scenarios and constraints.
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Define cutover runbooks, fallback plans, and communication flows.
Deliverables:
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Approved migration waves with clear entry and exit criteria.
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Detailed runbooks and communication plans for priority waves.
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Updated business case using data from VirtualReady.
Phase 3: Orchestrated execution
Scope: multi wave execution over several months.
Activities:
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Use VirtualReady and ReadyWorks automation to drive task coordination across teams.
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Track progress and issues in shared dashboards.
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Capture metrics such as incident volume, change success rates, and adherence to schedule.
Deliverables:
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Wave by wave execution reports.
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Consolidated program dashboard for steering committees.
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Lessons learned and optimization recommendations for future waves.
Phase 4: Post migration optimization
Scope: ongoing or time bound depending on the contract.
Activities:
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Use VirtualReady insights to identify optimization opportunities.
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Align post migration cleanup tasks with your managed services offering.
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Prepare final reports that show outcomes relative to the original business case.
Deliverables:
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Optimization and remediation backlog.
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Final value realization report.
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Recommendations for ongoing management with your services.
Because the underlying data, workflows, and reporting are all driven by VirtualReady, your teams apply this same structure to every client, adjusting only where necessary.
Business benefits for service providers
When you use VirtualReady to standardize your VMware to Nutanix services, you see benefits on both the delivery and commercial side.
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Higher margins. Less time spent on manual data wrangling and custom tooling means more time on high value design and advisory work.
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Faster time to revenue. Standardized assessment and planning phases let you move from contract signature to meaningful deliverables in weeks, not months.
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More predictable outcomes. Readiness scoring, dependency mapping, and wave analytics reduce surprises that would otherwise affect scope, timeline, or customer satisfaction.
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Stronger differentiation. You are not just another team that “knows VMware and Nutanix”. You are bringing a defined methodology and a proven platform to de risk complex migrations.
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Better upsell into managed services. The visibility and data you gain during migration becomes a natural foundation for ongoing optimization and management offerings.
In short, VirtualReady helps you turn a noisy, one off project space into a consistent VMware-to-Nutanix practice you can confidently scale.
Getting started: build one playbook, prove it with one client
You do not need to redesign your entire services portfolio overnight. A pragmatic path looks like this:
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Choose a flagship offering.
Define a named VMware to Nutanix service where VirtualReady will be the backbone of discovery, planning, and orchestration. -
Document a first version of the playbook.
Map your phases, key activities, and standard deliverables. Identify where VirtualReady and ReadyWorks will handle data, workflows, and reporting. -
Pilot with a friendly client.
Use the playbook on a single engagement, gather feedback from your own delivery teams and from the customer, and refine. -
Train your teams and scale.
Once the playbook is validated, roll it out across regions and sales teams and update your marketing collateral accordingly.
Over time, you can create variations for different customer sizes, industries, or risk profiles, all built on the same VirtualReady foundation.
FAQ
How does VirtualReady fit into our existing VMware and Nutanix tools?
VirtualReady does not replace Nutanix migration tooling or your existing VMware utilities. It sits alongside them, integrating data from VMware, Nutanix, and IT operations tools, and uses that data to drive planning, orchestration, and reporting.
Can we brand the service as our own offering?
Yes. VirtualReady and the ReadyWorks platform operate behind the scenes as the engine for your assessment and migration playbooks. You can surface the outputs in your own branded reports, decks, and portals as part of your VMware-to-Nutanix services.
Will our consultants have to learn a completely new way of working?
VirtualReady is designed to align with the phases and tasks your teams already perform. The difference is that data collection, stakeholder engagement, and readiness analysis are handled in a more consistent, automated way, which reduces manual workload and makes outcomes more predictable.
How does VirtualReady help us win deals, not just deliver them?
Because VirtualReady gives you standardized assessments, wave plans, and dashboards, you can use sample outputs in presales conversations. This helps prospects see exactly what they will get from your VMware to Nutanix services and makes it easier to compare your structured approach against competitors.
One next step
If you want to explore how VirtualReady could underpin a VMware-to-Nutanix migration offering for your clients, start by defining a single assessment and planning package and use VirtualReady to deliver it consistently for your next engagement.
