In September last year, virtualization.info reported about VMware starting the development of a management solution for Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) cloud computing platforms called vCloud Director. vCloud Director was developed from the engine of Lab Manager, which VMware acquired from Akimbi June 2006. Later we were informed by a member of the virtualization.info Vanguards community, that VMware was planning to phase out Lab Manager within a year, embedding its capabilities in vCloud Director which was released in September last year.
Last week VMware announced it will discontinue additional major releases of vCenter Lab Manager, making Lab Manager 4 (released in July 2009) the last Lab Manager product supported by VMware until May 1st, 2013.
VMware offers Support and Subscription (SnS) customers of existing Lab Manager licenses the ability to exchange their licenses for a vCloud Director license at no additional cost. For more information see the Lab Manager product lifecycle FAQ.