We asked VMware CEO Pat Gelsinger if he was going to be the next CEO of EMC ... and he didn't say no

EMC's long-standing CEO Joe Tucci has been working without a contract since February, and he has publicly confirmed, many times, that the search is on for his replacement.

He was expected to retire in February 2015, when his contract expired. That didn't happen, and what he says when he's asked about it (which is all the time), is that he's in no rush to leave and will give the board all the time it needs.

So who would the board hire to replace him? There's one obvious answer, the guy that was being groomed to replace Tucci for eons it seemed, Pat Gelsinger, who left EMC a couple of years to become CEO of VMware, EMC's crown jewel subsidiary.

With VMware under his belt, Gelsinger now has experience running a public company in which EMC has a controlling stake. EMC poached Gelsinger from Intel in 2009, after a 30-year career there, mentored by star Intel CEO Andy Grove and rising to general manager. At EMC, Gelsinger quickly rose to COO and was widely considered to be Tucci's heir.

Gelsinger has still been deep in EMC's business, including talks involving activist investor Elliott Management who has been pushing EMC to sell-off VMware's shares and make other changes.

Tucci has refused to chop up the company's Federation of subsidiaries, but in July he did promise to cut $850 million in expenses, including another round of layoffs.

We recently talked with Gelsinger about his life and career and asked him about the Elliott thing.

"Remember the activist is in the EMC shares, not in the VMware shares. I sit at table at many of the discussions, need to be involved to represent the VMware perspective, but it's mostly an EMC thing," he told us. "Inside of that, obviously the core issue is that EMC has under-performed the market in the industry transition that they're in. There's a challenge for how can we be more successful in both stock prices."

So we asked him point blank: Was he going to be the next CEO of EMC? This was his answer:

I'm happy with what I'm doing. I'm a farm boy from Pennsylvania. I'm thrilled with the position I'm in. We serve at the pleasure of the board. Happy to serve in whatever capacity the board would like me to going forward.