Broadcom reveals advancements empowering VMware Cloud Foundation.

Broadcom Inc. has just announced the latest updates to its VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF), which is their flagship private cloud platform. These updates aim to support customers’ digital innovation by providing faster infrastructure modernization, improved developer productivity, and enhanced cyber resiliency and security, all while keeping the total cost of ownership low.

According to Paul Turner, Vice President of Products at Broadcom’s VMware Cloud Foundation Division, VCF is the first private-cloud platform in the industry that combines the power of public and private clouds with unmatched simplicity and value in terms of cost. With the latest release, VCF is addressing key requirements based on customer input. The new VCF Import functionality is expected to be a game changer as it accelerates VCF adoption and improves time to value. Additionally, a set of new capabilities will help IT teams meet developers’ needs more quickly without increasing business risk. Overall, this release puts VCF on track to deliver on its full promise for customers.

VCF is specifically designed to modernize infrastructure and drive innovation by offering integrated, enterprise-class compute, networking, storage, management, and security across any environment. It includes native Kubernetes support for both virtual machines (VMs) and containerized workloads on a single platform. This means that advanced artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) workloads can be run at an enterprise scale. VCF also provides integrated data services capabilities.

One of the key advantages of VCF is its ability to continuously optimize performance and costs while protecting businesses from threats. It achieves this through advanced observability and insights. Customers can rely on VCF throughout their entire private cloud journey, from initial adoption to continuous operations. Furthermore, VCF offers license portability, allowing customers to purchase subscriptions for the new VCF software and seamlessly move between their on-premises environment and supported endpoints.

Let’s take a closer look at some of the new advancements in VCF:

1. Modernize Infrastructure: The new VCF Import capability enables the integration of existing vSphere and vSAN environments into VMware Cloud Foundation. This means that customers can centralize management and optimize resources without the need for a full rebuild of their environment. This functionality will transform current customer setups, resulting in greater efficiency, lower costs, and faster time to value. VCF now also supports vSAN Max and vSAN ESA stretched clusters, providing customers with petabyte-scale disaggregated storage and active-active availability. Additionally, the new VCF Edge offers an optimized configuration for edge use cases, providing scalable, cost-efficient, flexible, and hassle-free management from the data center to the edge.

2. Cloud Experience for Developers: The latest release of VCF simplifies application deployment and management with quick start templates, easy network integration, and advanced performance insights. This streamlines the process and enables faster time to market and increased developer productivity. VCF now offers Tanzu Kubernetes Grid (TKG) as an independent service, delivering updates aligned with upstream Kubernetes to provide developers with the latest versions quickly. VCF networking allows developers to focus on coding and testing rather than dealing with complex network requirements. It also facilitates better collaboration among development teams and supports more efficient continuous integration/continuous deployment (CI/CD) pipelines. Enhancements to VCF networking enable rapid setup and configuration, moving away from traditional VLAN-based network setups to advanced NSX virtual networking. Another notable addition is VMware Avi Load Balancer with VCF, which provides self-service load balancing as a service for DevOps and AppOps teams, allowing IT to deploy load balancing at the speed of applications.

3. Security and Resilience: VCF, along with associated add-ons like VMware Live Recovery and VMware vDefend lateral security, ensures the integrity of private cloud environments, higher availability, optimized network performance, malware/ransomware prevention, and robust data protection. The new ESXi Live Patching feature allows administrators to apply critical patches to ESXi hosts without requiring maintenance Windows, reducing downtime. The Flexible VCF Component upgrade provides the ability to apply the latest patches available at the time of upgrading to a new VCF version. These advancements streamline patch management and enhance system reliability. Dual DPU support with vSphere Distributed Services Engine ensures continuity and protection against DPU failures, providing full isolation of dual independent DPUs and doubling the offload capacity per host. vSAN Data Protection makes it easier for administrators to protect and recover virtual machines (VMs) from accidental deletions and ransomware attacks. VMware vDefend lateral security delivers increased distributed and gateway firewall scale, security information and event management (SIEM) integration for enhanced east-west ransomware prevention, and on-premises network detection and response (NDR) for threat triaging. Lastly, VMware Avi integration with SDDC Manager streamlines the lifecycle management of Avi software, from deployment to ongoing operations.

Dave McCarthy, Research Vice President at IDC, emphasizes the need for private clouds in light of the excitement and concerns surrounding AI and data security. Enterprises must ensure that private corporate data remains within their control and doesn’t end up in public AI models. The choice of building private clouds will depend on each organization’s unique requirements, such as updating legacy infrastructure, meeting developer needs, or creating a more secure and reliable environment for AI/ML applications. McCarthy believes that VMware Cloud Foundation continues to evolve as a private cloud platform, and the latest innovations from Broadcom should help customers of all sizes accelerate adoption.

In addition to the updates in VMware Cloud Foundation, Broadcom is also introducing VMware vSphere Foundation 5.2, which is the next evolution of their industry-leading vSphere solution. This update aims to support modern IT requirements by enhancing operational efficiency, elevating security, and boosting workload performance to accelerate innovation. Some of the key innovations in vSphere Foundation include ESXi Live Patching for faster updates with zero downtime, easy access for developers to self-service infrastructure via the vSphere IaaS control plane and a Local Consumption Interface, asynchronous updates for Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Service, simplified management through a unified console, improved end-user experience and security with single sign-on across all product components.

Broadcom expects VMware Cloud Foundation 5.2 and VMware vSphere Foundation 5.2 to be available in their fiscal Q3FY24.

In conclusion, the latest updates to VMware Cloud Foundation by Broadcom bring significant advancements to the private cloud platform. These updates address customer needs for faster infrastructure modernization, improved developer productivity, and enhanced cyber resiliency and security. With features like VCF Import, VCF Edge, and simplified application deployment, VCF continues to evolve as a comprehensive solution for modern IT requirements. The addition of VMware vSphere Foundation 5.2 further enhances operational efficiency, security, and workload performance. Overall, these updates from Broadcom are expected to accelerate the adoption of private clouds for organizations of all sizes.

Background Information

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About Broadcom: Founded in 1961, Broadcom is a leading global technology company headquartered in the United States. They specialize in semiconductor and infrastructure software solutions. Broadcom's innovations in connectivity, networking, and storage technologies have made them a key player in the industry, with a focus on enabling seamless communication and connectivity in the digital world.

  

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About IDC: IDC, or International Data Corporation, is a global provider of market intelligence, advisory services, and events for the information technology, telecommunications, and consumer technology markets. Established in 1964, IDC offers valuable insights into industry trends, market forecasts, and technology adoption through its research and analysis. Their expertise aids businesses, governments, and IT professionals in making informed decisions and strategies.

  

Technology Explained

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DPU: Unlike traditional CPUs, DPUs ( The Data Processing Unit) specialize in tasks like networking, storage, and security, freeing up the CPU for other jobs. This leads to faster and more efficient data processing, making it crucial for handling modern, data-heavy applications in cloud computing, edge computing, and IoT.

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Kubernetes: Kubernetes is a popular technology used in the computer industry for managing and deploying applications. It is an open-source platform that automates the process of managing and scaling applications in a cluster of computers. This means that instead of manually configuring and managing each individual computer, Kubernetes allows for a more efficient and streamlined approach. It is especially useful for companies that have a large number of applications and need to constantly update and scale them. With Kubernetes, developers can easily deploy and manage their applications, ensuring they run smoothly and efficiently. This technology has become an essential tool for modern software development, allowing companies to save time and resources while delivering high-quality applications to their users.

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VLAN: VLAN (Virtual Local Area Network) is a technology used in computer networking that allows for the segmentation of a physical network into multiple logical networks. It is used to create multiple isolated networks within a single physical network, allowing for greater flexibility and control over network traffic. VLANs are commonly used in the computer industry to separate different departments or groups of users, such as those in a large organization, or to provide secure access to a network. VLANs can also be used to segment a network into multiple virtual networks, allowing for greater control over network traffic and improved security. Additionally, VLANs can be used to provide access to a network from remote locations, such as from home or from a mobile device.

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VMware: VMware is an industry leader in virtualization technology, allowing for the effective virtualization of computer hardware, networks, and operating systems. Any organization needing to quickly and efficiently deploy complex network environments can utilize VMware, allowing for greater flexibility than physical solutions. VMware products are especially popular in the enterprise segment, as they offer cost savings through increased worker productivity and improved resource utilization. Virtualized services hosted on VMware offer better scaleability and reliability, as well as improved fault-tolerance and cost savings associated with server consolidation. VMware also provides support for the latest hardware and software components, ensuring compatibility with a wide range of applications and services. Furthermore, VMware products provide a secure computing environment, as virtual machines are isolated from each other, preventing the spread of viruses and other threats from one virtual machine to another.