IBM PowerVM

As a cloud provider we use many IBM Power systems. They all come with IBM PowerVM built-in to provide virtualisation services. Together we have hundreds of partitions (virtual machines or LPARs as IBM calls them) running; we can dynamically change CPU- and memory allocation, move running workloads from one physical server to another etc. Also the Virtual I/O Servers provide each LPAR access to the physical network and to disks (LUNs) on the SAN. Redundant VIOS ensures high availability and the PowerVM firmware is robust, safe and highly efficient.

IBM PowerVM only is available on IBM POWER machines. It makes live much easier, compared to bare metal machines (OPAL) or machines with KVM. Personally I would not like to manage systems that don't have IBM PowerVM.
The current line-up always includes IBM PowerVM (firmware built-in).

We are Using IBM PowerVM for virtualization in our organization. IBM PowerVM is used to virtualize the environment on IBM Power series hardware to utilize the hardware resources more efficiently. We are using a dual IBM PowerVM setup with the configuration of NPIV (for fiber port virtualization), SEA(for network virtualization), and VSCSI (for virtual SCSI) to host the multiple VMs on the same hardware in the environment.

IBM Power VM is well suited in a large environment where we have to run multiple virtual machines on a single hardware and utilize the hardware more efficiently. It directly saves the cost of the organization. Due to the high licensing cost of IBM Power VM, it's less appropriate for smaller, less critical applications that do not need a lot of performance.

IBM Power VM is the virtualization engine used for [the] IBM Power system [architectures]. It is used to create and maintain logical partitions for IBM i OS, AIX, and Red Hat Linux. This makes it a vital part of system design and [day-to-day] system management. Because it is used in a for sale production cloud it has a direct correlation to ongoing revenue for the organization.

Again, the inability to access the intel world [limits] it. However, products like VM do not offer entry into the IBM Power processing arena. Power VM is clearly a [server-oriented] tool. It does not appear to make much of an attempt to address other market segments. Maybe some kind of "connectors" might be [feasable]? Its use is pretty much limited to products firmly in the IBM orbit.

We use IBM PowerVM across the whole organization for a variety of functions. We are currently running about 15 different IBM Power servers ranging from power7 to power9. The majority of those are running IBM PowerVM, and we have over 100 LPARs running on them.

It is suited well for enterprise-level, mission critical applications because of its reliability and flexibility as well as the performance. Due to the cost, it is probably less appropriate for smaller, less critical applications that do not need a lot of performance.

PowerVM is used to provide virtual AIX servers for database applications, some end user applications, and infrastructure apps such as email gateways. These database applications provide data stores for applications across the enterprise. The top 10% of the databases consume 90% of the capacity and IO throughput of the enterprise.