vmware-cmd was included in earlier version of the ESX Service Console. A vmware-cmd command has been available in the vCLI package since ESXi version 3.0.
Older versions of vmware-cmd support a set of connection options and general options that differ from the options in other vCLI commands. The vmware-cmd vCLI command supports these options. The vCLI command also supports the standard vCLI --server, --username, --password, and --vihost options. vmware-cmd does not support other connection options.