When he first took over VMware in 2008, Maritz, who spent 14 years at the Redmond, Washington giant, was then president of EMC's cloud computing division, and did so at a tumultuous time after VMware CEO and co-founder Diane Greene had been ousted by the board. At the time, VMware's stock prices took a hit on news that it was lowering financial expectations, according to IT portal Tech Target. Some also felt Maritz appointment was surprising but VMware's fortunes turned quickly and he was able to steer the company out of trouble and established it firmly as a leader in the virtualization space. Gelsinger's accession, however, comes at a time that VMware is being aggressively challenged by various competitors including leading names like Microsoft, Oracle, and Citrix Systems. But when asked about this at a press conference on the opening morning, Maritz gave a very well coordinated response to the tune of waving Microsoft off as not a big competitor in this space.