Trying to come up with a list of 100 vendors who represent the changes happening in the virtualization industry is a tough task. The biggest problem is defining what virtualization is in an industry where it appears that almost anything can be virtualized. It was easy when vendors only talked about server virtualization or storage virtualization. Now, even keeping up with the vendors themselves is a difficult task. They range from giants like VMware and Microsoft to tiny startups, many of whom have either been recently acquired or are in the process of being acquired as larger companies build their technology base.

CRN's annual Virtualization 100 is a who's who of virtualization players, spanning every facet of the market from desktop virtualization to virtualization management to storage and server virtualization.

Also, be sure to check out the first part of the Virtualization 100 to see if your virtualization partners made the cut.