In July 2007 IDC predicted that the virtualization services market would reach $11.7 billion by 2011.
While it’s too early to verify the accuracy of this forecast, there are some evident signs that consulting firms are becoming an interesting acquisition targets as much as the virtualization startups.
In July 2007 Glasshouse Technologies acquired RapidApp, and now INX acquires AccessFlow for an undisclosed sum.
AccessFlow is a top performing firm in the consulting industry: in 2007 won the Rising Star of Americas award at VMware VMworld and in 2008 won the Rainmaker award at VMware Partner Exchange.
The acquisition is specially interesting because INX currently has a major consulting business around Cisco IP communication solutions.
Virtualization can obviously serve IPC needs but seems a far-away area where to invest, so INX must have serious reasons to extend so much its range of activities.