Insight
VMware ESXi Migration to HCI: VMware vs Sangfor, H3C and xFusion
Published by Hakobi · 20 September 2026
VMware ESXi migration to hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) means moving your virtual machines off ESXi and onto a platform that combines compute, storage and networking on the same servers. For many businesses the trigger is a licensing renewal. This guide explains why, compares VMware with three HCI platforms (Sangfor HCI, H3C UIS and xFusion FusionOne), and sets out how to choose and how to move without a long outage.
Why businesses are moving off ESXi
Broadcom stopped selling perpetual VMware licences in December 2023 and now sells subscription bundles, vSphere Foundation and Cloud Foundation, licensed per core. For many businesses the next renewal is the first time the new model shows up on a quote. The alternatives are real, but each has different strengths, and switching without a plan puts the workloads that run the business at risk.
Comparing the platforms
This comparison uses the vendors' own documentation, and their claims are attributed to them. There is no independent like-for-like benchmark across these products, so treat the performance row as a starting point for sizing, not a ranking.
| Area | VMware (vSphere Foundation / Cloud Foundation) | Sangfor HCI | H3C UIS | xFusion FusionOne HCI |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Performance | Mature hypervisor; vSAN performance depends on hardware and design | KVM-based aSV; Sangfor says it rewrote the I/O stack for performance | H3C cites strong SPECvirt results for its CAS hypervisor | xFusion cites a leading SPECvirt result and a 1 TB rebuild in 10 minutes |
| Cost model | Subscription only, licensed per core; perpetual sales ended in December 2023 | Sangfor says its aSAN storage is included at no extra cost; licence terms by quote | Licence-based; H3C says a DR cluster can be added without upgrading the original licence | xFusion claims about 15% lower TCO; licensing not stated on the page we checked |
| Features | Deepest feature set; Cloud Foundation adds the wider private-cloud stack | Compute, storage, networking and security in one stack; Sangfor claims about 95% of vSphere's features | CAS compute with ONEStor storage; 2 to 6 replicas or erasure coding; async remote replication | Unified block, object and file storage; cross-site DR with a claimed RPO near zero |
| Integration | Widest third-party support, including native Veeam | Can attach to an existing SAN; Veeam plug-in in Veeam Backup & Replication 13.1 | Can manage existing VMware platforms alongside its own; no native Veeam hypervisor support found, agent-based backup instead | Lists 25+ partners in data protection, security and cloud management; no native Veeam support found |
| Ecosystem | Largest installed base, skills pool and tool ecosystem | Smaller, growing ecosystem | Part of H3C's wider network, server and storage stack | Part of xFusion's server range, with a VMware-based HCI variant also offered |
| Moving off ESXi | Not applicable | Sangfor's SCMT tool migrates agentlessly through vCenter, with a brief restart at cutover | Heterogeneous migration service, or OVA/OVF export and import | Confirm supported conversion tools and disk formats with xFusion |
Cost in this table describes how each product is licensed, not what it costs. Real cost comes from core counts, storage, support and licence term, so it can only be worked out after the environment is sized.
How to choose
There isn't one right platform. The choice follows a site survey: how many hosts and cores you run, how much storage and which existing SAN, which applications can't tolerate downtime, what your backup tooling supports, and who will support the platform locally afterwards. Specifications only mean something against those numbers, which is why we size the site before recommending any hardware or platform. Confirm local support and any regulatory requirements for your sector before you shortlist.
Moving the workloads
You have two broad options, and often use both:
- The target platform's own tools. Sangfor's SCMT, for example, reads VMs through vCenter without agents and needs only a brief restart at cutover, and H3C offers a heterogeneous migration service.
- A backup-based migration with Veeam Instant VM Recovery. Veeam starts the VM on the new platform straight from its backup, so downtime is limited to the cutover window and the original VM on ESXi stays untouched as a fallback until you retire it.
Veeam's Instant Recovery can target Microsoft Hyper-V, Nutanix AHV and Proxmox VE directly. For Sangfor aSV, Veeam 13.1 supports restoring VMware backups as Sangfor VMs through an entire-VM restore, and for platforms without native support Veeam still gives you a verified backup safety net and disk export (VMDK, VHD or VHDX) alongside the vendor's own migration tool. The full walkthrough is in our guide to migrating off VMware ESXi with Veeam Instant VM Recovery.
Sabah context
Many Sabah sites can't take a long outage on core systems, and few have a second site to test on, so a plan with a pilot, a wave-by-wave cutover and a rollback path matters more than which logo is on the new servers. Hakobi is a registered Veeam partner and holds the relevant Veeam certification, and we design and run these migrations alongside our Backup & Disaster Recovery and Managed IT Services. Pricing depends on host and core counts, storage, the platform chosen and the licence term, so request a quote and we'll scope it after a site survey.
Sources: End of availability of perpetual licensing, VMware; Sangfor migration guide, Sangfor; H3C UIS HCI Cloud Migration Guide, H3C ONEStor 3.0, H3C; FusionOne HCI, xFusion; Veeam Backup & Replication 13.1, Veeam.
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