Worcester Business Journal writes:

Two thousand eight will probably be the year that even tech outsiders start using the term "virtualization."

The technology - which allows companies to re-order and better harness the unused and underused computing power of their servers - gained a big buzz early this summer when Palo Alto, Calif.-based VMware raised $1.1 billion in an IPO: good news for Hopkinton-based EMC Corp., which became the majority owner of the company a year earlier.

In one way, VMware, the world's largest provider of virtualization software, is already the company that pulled EMC out of the doldrums. Now, the tech surprise of the year could represent the leading edge of a technology boom that could give a big jolt to the Central Massachusetts tech sector.

It couldn't come at a better time; the first quarter of 2007 was tough on tech. Forrester Research said the sector took a 2.6 percent dip, marking what was then the first decline in a year. Growth since then has been lackluster, and the promise of virtualization is one that carries big bucks.

Research firm IDC predicts that spending on virtualization technology will surpass $15 billion worldwide in three years. More than double what it was in 2006.

And competitors and colleagues scattered throughout the region have big expectation for the technology in 2008. That's because the area is home to a number of other smaller companies that also specialize in virtualization technology.

"If you look at 2007, virtualization really started to get on people's radar screens, and some of that has to do with VMware," said Susan Davis, vice president of Marlborough-based virtualization firm Egenera. "But what has really been driving it is the recognition by everything from developers to large corporations that computing has become incredibly inefficient and this is a way to change that."

A number of other companies are already integrating virtualization technology into their products. Framingham-based server firm Netezza, for example, uses the technology in some of its products. Scali Inc. in Marlborough specializes in a form of virtualization known as clustering.

"Certainly from the vendor landscape there are more and more companies using it for a myriad of issues," Davis said. "And from a customer's perspective it represents a lot of opportunity where the technology can address a lot of problems they face."

The virtualization movement - and the growth enjoyed by companies specializing in it, builds on the recent successes of other MetroWest-area companies with products specialized in re-tasking the ways large organizations use data.

The other bright star on the map: eClinicalWorks, the Westborough-based maker of electronic health record systems used by hospitals and doctors offices all over the country. That company is also expecting another bellwether year; it recently opened its New York City office, solidifying its expansion in the state where it signed a $19.8 million deal with the city's health department, setting the stage for an even bigger expansion of one the nation's fastest growing technology companies.

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Read the rest of this articel from the Worcester Business Journal, here.