Buying spree: VMware’s acquisitions reflect present and future of enterprise computing

At the current rate that VMware Inc. is buying companies, the 21-year-old virtualization and cloud computing software provider might need to add another hall for its upcoming VMworld gathering in San Francisco, set to begin on Monday, Aug. 26, just to accommodate the increased headcount.On Wednesday, VMware announced that it would acquire Intrinsic, a serverless computing security startup. The acquisition followed the news barely five days prior that VMware would Veriflow Systems Inc., another startup focused on security through network verification technology. And today, the company announced it’s acquiring cybersecurity company Carbon Black and Pivotal Software Inc. for several billion dollars.These most recent acquisitions represent the 13th and 14th companies acquired by VMware over the past 20 months. That’s more than the firm purchased in the preceding five years, and 2019 is not done yet.