VIRTUAL DESKTOP STRATEGIES
MacStadium | September 28, 2022
MacStadium, the industry-leading Mac private cloud and software-as-a-service provider enabling all macOS workloads, today announced the debut of Orka Workspace to enable high-performance, secure desktop access to cloud-hosted macOS environments — anytime, anywhere and by any device. The unveiling occurs during the 2022 Jamf Nation User Conference (JNUC) occurring from Sept. 27 through Sept. 29 at the Hilton San Diego Bayfront hotel.
Companies need to find secure and flexible ways for their employees to access secure work computing environments from anywhere, especially now that 58 percent of American workers work remotely at least one day a week. Orka Workspace represents a revolution in secure desktop virtualization. Until now, no such option existed in the Mac ecosystem.
“We are excited to reveal the full advantages of MacStadium’s Orka Workspace platform at JNUC 2022 the largest gathering of Apple enthusiasts in the world, Orka Workspace’s introduction is nothing short of a paradigm shift for professionals who work in Mac environments, giving organizations the ability to easily and securely manage user workspaces wherever they may be, and on any device.”
Chris Chapman, MacStadium’s senior vice president and chief technology officer
Orka Workspace is designed to connect and manage your macOS computing environment. It uniquely solves Mac virtualization complexities and IT teams’ Mac-virtual secure desktop needs. It leverages MacStadium’s Orka Platform to provide unmatched macOS virtual-machine provisioning and scalability.
For more than a decade, MacStadium has supplied reliable private clouds and dedicated resources for macOS workloads, combining patented technology, proprietary configurations and unparalleled expertise in Apple infrastructure. MacStadium has the capability to meet the needs of all customers from individual developers to Fortune 100 companies. DevOps engineers, SaaS professionals, iOS developers, mobile-testing teams and enterprise users rely on MacStadium for its guaranteed uptime with expert support and data centers located worldwide.
MacStadium to Present and Demo Orka Workspace at JNUC 2022
JNUC has hosted Apple administrators for more than 10 years. Attendees may look forward to expert product insights, demos, deep-dive education sessions, community camaraderie and presentations. Apple IT professionals, users and InfoSec leaders, in particular, will have the chance to learn new, improved ways to manage and secure Apple devices, simplifying workflows and augmenting worker productivity.
About MacStadium
Founded in 2011 and headquartered in Atlanta, MacStadium is a private cloud and software-as-a-service leader delivering scalable and secure enterprise cloud solutions exclusively for macOS. The company’s suite of advanced software-enabled infrastructure, combined with its innovative technology, delivers the security, performance, reliability and flexibility its customers require for successful app development on Apple devices. Powered by MacStadium, Orka (Orchestration with Kubernetes on Apple) is the only virtualization layer available for Mac build infrastructure based on Docker and Kubernetes technology. MacStadium is a Summit Partners portfolio company with growing operations in Las Vegas, Silicon Valley and Dublin, Ireland. Additional operations are scheduled to come online in Mumbai, India in early 2023.
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VIRTUAL SERVER MANAGEMENT
Verizon | September 19, 2022
Verizon, the leader in Virtualized Radio Access Network (VRAN) innovation, has now deployed over 8,000 virtualized cell sites with a goal of deploying over 20,000 by the end of 2025. This technology milestone allows Verizon to rapidly respond to customers’ varied latency and computing needs, and provides greater flexibility and agility in the introduction of new products and services. The move to a cloud-based, virtualized architecture with standardized interfaces in every part of the network leads to greater flexibility, faster delivery of services, greater scalability, and improved cost efficiency in networks.
“We are building the network with the most advanced technology available, because we know people rely on our network and we are committed to delivering the variety and quality of services our customers need, Even while driving the most aggressive network deployment in our company’s history, we know giving people access to 5G is only part of the winning equation.”
Adam Koeppe, Senior Vice President of Planning and Technology at Verizon
Key 5G use cases focused on providing the best, most efficient network for customers, will heavily rely on the programmability of virtualized networks. Networks must serve IoT devices that do very little networking and stay in place, smartphones with infinite opportunities to use data in a highly mobile environment, and complex solutions like Augmented Reality that require massive computing capabilities on the edge of the network. These various network solutions rely on a correlated variety of resources from the network, which until recently have been defined rigidly and manually. Using orchestration and automation capabilities at scale on virtual infrastructure, Verizon automates network configuration changes and resource scaling dynamically based on demand. This is one of the greatest benefits of virtualizing a network - essentially building programmability into the network.
It takes more than just virtualization
While the advancement of virtualization technology is a critical step towards advanced 5G solutions, Verizon is working on many other technological advancements in parallel to deliver to customers the most robust, advanced, and reliable network in the world.
Verizon recently announced a massive advancement in its packet core network, quadrupling the capacity on its fiber network.
It also recently announced it is beginning to deploy 100 MHz of C-band spectrum in many markets across the US– a significant increase from the 60 MHz of spectrum it has deployed in 5G markets to date. Almost doubling the spectrum available for 5G Ultra Wideband turbo charges the service, offering significantly higher speeds, much greater capacity to accommodate more customers and more robust services, and allows Verizon to offer 5G Home broadband and Business Internet services to more customers.
ORAN - Disaggregating the hardware and software functions on the network through widespread virtualization creates the foundation for ORAN. ORAN is an evolution of the virtual network architecture with the potential to bring many benefits in terms of deployment flexibility, faster innovation in an open environment, and greater service options by increasing the opportunity for new entrants to provide competitive and advanced solutions. More competition, more innovation, and increased supplier diversity will all be a net benefit to operators and consumers.
Advanced antenna configurations - Verizon continues to drive antenna efficiency, including widespread use of Massive MIMO, which leads to greater speeds and less signal interference resulting in greater capacity and speed for customers.
MEC - Mobile EdgeComputing (MEC) moves the data processing done by the applications and services closer to the customer at the edge of the network. This shortens the roundtrip distance data travels from the device to servers that can process data. This helps critical, performance-impacting applications respond more quickly and efficiently. Verizon’s MEC is deployed in a rack next to our Core network gear which enables the lowest possible latency. We are partnering with the top cloud partners, driving tighter network integration/differentiation through API’s. Verizon recently expanded its MEC ecosystem by bringing AWS Wavelength zones to Nashville and Tampa and now reaches 19 metro areas. This means that 75% of the U.S. population is now within 150 miles of VZ 5G Edge.
Webscale platform - Using a Verizon-owned and operated webscale platform, Verizon engineers have created a cloud-native architecture. Verizon’s telco cloud has been optimized for telco workloads, unique telco regulatory and performance requirements, and tighter integration with other operations systems. This unique cloud architecture drives efficiency and allows functionality to be distributed throughout the network. Verizon’s native telco workloads (Core, RAN, signaling, and user plane) run more efficiently and with better performance and resiliency when deployed on this optimized cloud platform.
Verizon remains very active in global standards bodies and continue to work with experts globally to set standards and expectations for future technology.
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VIRTUAL DESKTOP TOOLS
VMware | September 01, 2022
VMware Explore US 2022 – VMware Inc.today announced new innovations across its expanding networking and security portfolio that will help customers embrace the cloud operating model. These new innovations include:
Project Northstar for multi-cloud networking, security and end-to-end visibility
Expansion of network detection and visibility to the Carbon Black Cloud endpoint protection platform, with early access available now
Project Trinidad that extends and advances VMware’s API security and analytics
Project Watch, a new approach to multi-cloud networking and security that provides advanced app to app policy controls
“Enterprises are facing an unprecedented level of threat and complexity as they operate in today’s multi-cloud world, VMware is radically transforming how our customers consume networking and security – allowing them to realize the agility and efficiencies of the cloud operating model through a cloud-smart approach. With a privileged position in the infrastructure and a scale out distributed software architecture, we’re able to leverage the intrinsic attributes of our platforms and deliver these unique solutions in a consumption-oriented manner.”
Tom Gillis, senior vice president and general manager of VMware’s Networking and Advanced Security business group
Simplifying Networking and Security for Multi-Cloud
In Project Northstar, VMware announces a major advancement of its NSX platform. Announced in technology preview today, Project Northstar will transform how enterprises consume networking and security in a multi-cloud world. Project Northstar will deliver multi-cloud networking, security, workload mobility and end-to-end threat detection and response with a centralized cloud-console for consistent and simplified software-as-a-service (SaaS) consumption. This family of services includes network & security policy management, network detection and response (NDR), network visibility and analytics (NSX Intelligence), advanced load balancing (ALB), and workload mobility (HCX) for private cloud environments and VMware Cloud deployments.
“As an innovator in software-defined networking, VMware offers a full-stack of networking and security services in an integrated solution that benefits thousands of enterprise customers today,” said Umesh Mahajan, senior vice president and general manager for VMware’s Networking and Security business unit. “Customers are seeking a uniform policy model across multi-cloud deployments, along with consistent network connectivity, security, and load balancing services. With Project Northstar we continue to shape how enterprises consume networking and security in a multi-cloud world.”
Today, with the latest update to VMware NSX 4.0 and VMware vSphere 8, NSX networking and security functions can now be implemented on Data Processing Units (DPUs, also known as SmartNICs) connected to the host hypervisor. Offloading NSX services to the DPU can accelerate networking and security functions without impacting the host CPUs, addressing the needs of modern applications and other network-intensive and latency-sensitive applications.
Strengthening Lateral Security
The growth in laterally moving threats requires security teams to pay closer attention to east-west network traffic. Examining traffic through network taps is no longer sufficient. Modern distributed cloud architectures can further exacerbate blind spots. VMware’s architecture allows customers to see processes running in an endpoint, packets crossing the network, access points, and the inner workings of both traditional and modern apps to identify and stop threats others can’t. As part of today's announcements, VMware is strengthening its lateral security capabilities by embedding network detection and visibility into Carbon Black Cloud's endpoint protection platform, which is now available to select customers in early access. This extended detection and response (XDR) telemetry adds network detection and visibility to endpoints with no changes to infrastructure or endpoints, providing customers with extended visibility into their environment across endpoints and networks leaving attackers nowhere to hide.
Limited visibility into the east-west traffic between microservices also puts modern applications at greater risk. Project Trinidad, which is in tech preview, extends VMware's API security and analytics by deploying sensors on Kubernetes clusters and uses machine learning with business logic inference to detect anomalous behavior in east-west traffic between microservices.
Findings from VMware’s recent Global Incident Response Threat Report reveal that ransomware actors continue to evolve their cyber extortion strategies. Ransomware will continue to be a business reality, and VMware uniquely makes recovery from an attack faster, more predictable, and less prone to error with VMware Ransomware Recovery for VMware Cloud DR, a new offering unveiled at VMware Explore. This new, purpose-built ransomware recovery-as-a-service solution enables safe recovery that prevents re-infection of IT and line-of-business production workloads through its innovative use of an on-demand isolated recovery environment on VMware Cloud on AWS. Guided recovery workflows allow customers to quickly identify recovery point candidates, validate restore points using embedded behavioral analysis, and recover data with minimal loss.
Expanding Security for the Data Center and Cloud Edge
Last year, VMware announced the industry-first elastic application security edge (EASE) which enables the networking and security infrastructure at the data center or cloud edge to flex and adjust as app needs change. To help customers preserve their investments in expensive hardware appliances that are incapable of adapting to changing app environments, VMware is introducing:
VMware NSX Gateway Firewall: VMware’s next-generation firewall now offers a new stateful active-active edge scale-out capability that significantly increases network throughput for stateful services. VMware now offers advanced threat prevention capabilities with IDPS, malware analysis, sandboxing, URL filtering, TLS proxy, stateful firewall, and stateful Network Address Translation (NAT) that extend centralized security controls to physical and virtual workloads at the data center and cloud edge.
VMware NSX Advanced Load Balancer: With a goal to deliver multi-layer application security at the edge, closer to applications and users for better efficiency and performance, VMware NSX Advanced Load Balancer (ALB) is adding new bot management capabilities, while enhancing the security capabilities of its web application firewall, malware detection, security analytics, and DDoS protection. These enhancements at the edge help customers maintain a consistent security posture with operational simplicity, extending protection from traditional to cloud-native container-based applications deployed across multi-cloud environments. VMware NSX ALB’s ability to enforce API security policies in line with application delivery traffic helps customers in protecting their north-south APIs.
Project Watch: At VMware Explore 2022, VMware is unveiling Project Watch, a new approach to multi-cloud networking and security that will provide advanced app-to-app policy controls to help with continuous risk and compliance assessment. In technology preview, Project Watch will help network security and compliance teams to continuously observe, assess, and dynamically mitigate risk and compliance problems in composite multi-cloud applications.
Securing the Edge for the Distributed Workforce
In the past two years, enterprise customers have fundamentally changed how they build and deploy networks and access to support distributed workers. The market for secure access service edge (SASE) solutions is expected to nearly triple by 2026 with security being a key driver of growth as enterprises strategically invest for the new age of distributed applications and hybrid work, according to the Dell'Oro Group1. A leader in SD-WAN2, VMware is now offering additional deployment flexibility to customers who want a multi-phase journey from their current network and endpoint management solutions to a next-generation SASE offering by adding new web proxy-based connectivity to VMware Cloud Web Security.
VMware Cross-Cloud™ services Helps Customers Navigate the Multi-Cloud Era
At VMware Explore 2022, VMware is unveiling new and enhanced offerings for VMware Cross-Cloud services to help customers navigate the multi-cloud era with freedom, flexibility and security. VMware Cross-Cloud services is a portfolio of cloud services that deliver a unified and simplified way to build, operate, access, and better secure any application on any cloud from any device. VMware Cross-Cloud service pillars include 1) App Platform, 2) Cloud Management, 3) Cloud & Edge Infrastructure, 4) Security & Networking, and 5) Anywhere Workspace. For the latest news and more on how VMware is delivering a faster and smarter path to cloud for digital businesses, visit the VMware Explore 2022 media kit.
About VMware Explore
VMware Explore is an evolution of the company's flagship conference, VMworld. VMware Explore aims to be the industry’s go-to-event for all things multi-cloud. This year, it will feature industry-led solution and technical sessions, an extensive ecosystem of 90% of the top cloud partners, a thriving marketplace of multi-cloud ISVs and several networking events. To learn more about VMware Explore, please visit: www.vmware.com/explore.html.
About VMware
VMware is a leading provider of multi-cloud services for all apps, enabling digital innovation with enterprise control. As a trusted foundation to accelerate innovation, VMware software gives businesses the flexibility and choice they need to build the future. Headquartered in Palo Alto, California, VMware is committed to building a better future through the company’s 2030 Agenda.About VMware
VMware is a leading provider of multi-cloud services for all apps, enabling digital innovation with enterprise control. As a trusted foundation to accelerate innovation, VMware software gives businesses the flexibility and choice they need to build the future. Headquartered in Palo Alto, California, VMware is committed to building a better future through the company’s 2030 Agenda.
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