The University of Canberra Got Ahead of the Broadcom-VMware Shakeup

One way to avoid trouble is to sidestep it ahead of time. When Broadcom acquired VMware in late 2023, the IT team at the University of Canberra could breathe a sigh of relief because they did just that.

While many institutions scramble to reassess their reliance on VMware software in the wake of its acquisition by Broadcom, the University of Canberra remains calm and focused on the future.

"We started to look at how we could do things better, more cost-effectively," said Justin Mason, associate director of vendor and operations at the University of Canberra, during a press briefing at Nutanix’s 2024 .NEXT conference in Barcelona. 

That earnest exploration led them to Nutanix over a decade ago. Their early adoption of Nutanix hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) technology was auspicious. It shielded them from the uncertainties and potential complications that could’ve hit them if they hadn’t moved away from VMware software to Nutanix AHV virtualization.

“We are all AHV now,” Mason said. “We don’t have any VMware. We’ve been in that place now for a number of years, so we’ve been fortunate enough to miss this whole debacle around VMware and Broadcom at the moment.”

They sought to move away from their traditional three-tier architecture, experimenting first with Hyper-V on Nutanix and later with VMware on Nutanix.  The success of the VMware proof of concept sealed the deal, leading to a complete transition to Nutanix's HCI platform in 2014. 

“We were early adopters in the sense of when we jumped on the Nutanix platform at that time,” Mason explained. “We started to look at, well, how can we do this better? How can we do things more cost effectively? And that’s when we looked at Nutanix and hyperconverged.”

Scaling HCI to Power University Needs

Their strategic shift allowed the University to avoid the anxieties faced by organizations deeply entrenched in the VMware ecosystem. Today, the University boasts a robust infrastructure with hundreds of virtual machines running on Nutanix clusters, supporting critical systems, facilitating advanced subjects like AI and machine learning as the university evolves student experiences.

“We’ve probably about seven different clusters on Nutanix, 50 odd nodes, about 500 workloads, 500 odd VMs spread between the different cluster sets and some of our major corporate systems are running,” Mason shared.

He explained that the shift to Nutanix provided technological advantages and fostered a sense of stability and confidence in the university's IT infrastructure, which is key to its core mission: providing a quality education for its students. 

IT Infrastructure to Meet AI Student Needs

Mason said Nutanix’s role in supporting virtual desktops has been instrumental in achieving the University’s goal. He gave examples of how new capabilities aim to assist students or keep students engaged in their studies.

“Putting in systems now that can track the student experience and kind of flag when students might need additional help,” he explained. 

The University’s IT system also powers demanding courses on AI and machine learning.

“We've had subjects in artificial intelligence and deep learning and machine learning for quite a number of years, and some of those subjects have been complemented by students using virtual desktops via Nutanix, powered by GPUs to give them the additional resources they need to do those subjects,” he said. 

“And by leveraging Nutanix, that's allowed the students to access those resources from anywhere at any time. They don't need to come into a specialized lab running big hulking machines. They can do it from a web browser on their normal machine, whether they're on campus or at home.”

The University of Canberra's story serves as a compelling example of how foresight and a willingness to embrace new technologies can mitigate risks and pave the way for a more stable and successful future.

“I know a lot of other organizations are kind of feeling that pressure now, so that’s one less thing we have to worry about,” Mason said. "With Nutanix, everything is managed through a single pane of glass. This makes it far easier for our team to monitor and maintain our infrastructure."

He said there are times when the university needs to bring in an expert to work on an IT project or initiative. 

“But we've never found ourselves having to bring in a Nutanix expert, so to speak, because I guess that speaks for itself. It's pretty easy to manage.”