Virtual Desktop Strategies

VMware Cross-Cloud Services Now Available in Microsoft Azure Marketplace

VMware | April 13, 2022

VMware_Cross_Cloud
-VMware, Inc. (NYSE: VMW) today announced the availability of VMware Cross-Cloud services on Microsoft Azure Marketplace, an online store providing applications and services for use on Azure. VMware customers can take advantage of the trusted Azure cloud platform to accelerate application modernization, migrate workloads faster to the cloud, and more securely and efficiently scale virtual desktops to support a distributed workforce.

VMware Cross-Cloud services is a family of multi-cloud services customers can use to build, run, and manage applications in Microsoft Azure. The following VMware Cross-Cloud services are available immediately in Azure Marketplace:

  • Microsoft Azure VMware Solution: an integrated hybrid cloud service that delivers an operationally consistent and familiar way to run, manage and modernize VMware vSphere-based applications in the Azure Cloud, with seamless access to other innovative Azure services.
  • VMware Tanzu: a modular application platform for building, running, and managing modern apps on Azure and hybrid cloud infrastructure.
  • Azure Spring Cloud Enterprise Tier: a fully managed service for Spring applications from Microsoft built in collaboration with VMware. Enterprise tier is now in public preview.
  • VMware Horizon Cloud Service on Microsoft Azure: a VMware-managed service that delivers virtual desktops and applications directly from Microsoft Azure with all the benefits of VMware Horizon.

“For enterprises today, the ability to consume and deploy solutions that can deliver immediate business outcomes is an expectation. Availability of our VMware Cross-Cloud services on Azure Marketplace will enable better time to value and speed of execution for our customers,” said Zia Yusuf, senior vice president, strategic ecosystem and industry solutions, VMware. “With VMware Cross-Cloud services, customers can drive the digital innovation they seek, with the enterprise control they demand.”

“Through Microsoft Azure Marketplace, customers around the world can easily find, buy, and deploy partner solutions they can trust, all certified and optimized to run on Azure,” said Paul Maher, General Manager (Partner), Commercial Marketplace Services, Microsoft Corp. “We’re happy to welcome VMware Cross-Cloud services to the growing Azure Marketplace ecosystem.”

The Azure Marketplace is an online market for buying and selling cloud solutions certified to run on Azure. The Azure Marketplace helps connect companies seeking innovative, cloud-based solutions with partners who have developed solutions that are ready to use.

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.

Spotlight

Safecoder is here! VMware, partnering with Hugging Face, has brought their open source code LLM: Starcoder on-premises as the "Safecoder" solution. Safecoder lets customers provide a highly capable coding assistant to their development teams while maintaining control over proprietary data. Plus, Safecoder provides capabilities to fine-tune the underlying model on proprietary code to learn your coding style and guidelines.


Other News
Server Hypervisors, Backup and Disaster Recovery

Zyxel Communications to Partner with Windstream on 8 Gig Service Expansion

businesswire | July 25, 2023

Zyxel Communication, an industry-leading provider of secure broadband networking, Internet access and connected home products, will supply the WiFi 6E hardware needed to power Windstream’s 8 gig expansion this month, marking a major milestone in both companies’ dual efforts to expand fiber access across the U.S. As part of its high-speed fiber business, Kinetic by Windstream has enabled 8 gig service to more than 400,000 homes in its predominately rural 18-state service area, giving it a bigger 8 gig footprint than any other carrier within its 18-state service area. Zyxel will assist the fiber optic deployment by providing its EX7710 multi-gigabit ethernet gateway, as well as its WX5610 wireless extender, to customers upgrading to 8G service – allowing for lightning-fast connectivity throughout their home, even when multiple devices are in use. “Getting 100% fiber optic connections to more homes, especially in underserved communities, is a huge step toward keeping our customers on the cutting edge of Internet accessibility. But with more devices than ever connecting to the network, building a fiber infrastructure is only half the battle,” said Clay Fisher, chief marketing officer at Kinetic. “Zyxel has been an outstanding partner in our efforts to expand broadband, and their hardware will help ensure our customers can experience the full benefits of fiber.” Zyxel’s WiFi 6E router, EX7710 supports tri-band wireless, adding the new 6GHz bands to deliver faster, more reliable internet access throughout the home and office. Featuring both 10GbE WAN and 10GbE LAN to ensure 10 Gbps line rate data transfers, delivering unmatched connectivity. Experience lightning-fast WiFi speeds of up to 4.8 Gbps on both the 6GHz and 5GHz bands, providing unparalleled connectivity for all your devices, while ensuring smooth, low-latency connections even when multiple users are online. “Fiber is the future. That’s why it’s been great to see multiple countries dedicate resources to ensure all their residents, whether in the city or the country, have equal access to high-speed Internet,” said Brian Feng, Senior VP of Zyxel Communications. “In the US, we appreciate Windstream’s dedication to ensuring rural areas aren’t left out of the WiFi revolution, and we’re thrilled to be able to play a part in their expansion.” About Zyxel Communications Zyxel Communications delivers technological innovations and has connected the world to the internet for more than 30 years. Whether establishing access through fixed or mobile broadband solutions, Zyxel Communications offers a comprehensive and flexible portfolio of products that’s keeping service providers ahead of the competition.

Read More

Virtual Desktop Tools, Server Virtualization

Spectro Cloud brings open, secure Kubernetes management to government organizations with Palette VerteX

businesswire | July 19, 2023

Spectro Cloud announces new Palette VerteX Edition and new Spectro Cloud Government practice to meet the growing need for powerful management and security for Kubernetes (K8s) in the public sector. Kubernetes adoption is growing across the public sector, from federal and defense to state and local government. Public sector organizations are looking to K8s and the open-source, cloud-native ecosystem around it to help drive IT agility in pursuit of their mission. But IT and platform engineering teams are often held back from embracing their choice of K8s by limited resources and restrictions around security and compliance frameworks. To get the most from Kubernetes, they need the flexibility and simplicity to manage the full lifecycle of multiple Kubernetes distributions deployed in diverse environments, from cloud to edge, including air-gapped locations. And they need this without sacrificing security. Today Spectro Cloud announces a new edition of its award-winning Palette Kubernetes management platform to meet the needs of these government and public sector organizations, and other industries where security and compliance are paramount. “We developed Palette VerteX with extensive input from government agencies and customers, along with our public sector team’s decades of experience in delivering secure IT to government,” said Dave Cope, CRO of Spectro Cloud. “Palette VerteX builds on the firm foundation of our Palette enterprise platform to address the specific security requirements of public sector environments, including both military and civilian agencies.” Palette: trusted K8s management from data center to edge The award-winning Palette platform is already enabling thousands of platform engineers and DevOps professionals to deploy and manage their full-stack Kubernetes clusters in production, at scale. They have the power to choose all the components of their clusters and manage clusters consistently across edge, bare metal, data center and cloud. Palette’s deep automation of day 2 activities like patching and monitoring helps stretched teams focus on innovation and removes roadblocks to scale, whatever their mission. Palette already provides a unique combination of power and simplicity that has attracted enterprise customers in demanding and regulated industries, such as T-Mobile and GE HealthCare, which deal with sensitive data and mission-critical infrastructure at scale. From the start, Palette was engineered with robust security features including security scans, powerful RBAC, auditing and logging, and tamperproof edge device images. The Palette management platform can be deployed on-premises and even in air-gapped environments. New VerteX edition adds security capabilities Now the new Palette VerteX edition extends Palette’s security features further. VerteX supports the environments and technology platforms essential to government workloads, including deploying Kubernetes clusters in AWS GovCloud, and supporting Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL), Ubuntu LTS and Ubuntu Pro as the managed OS layer. Support for Azure Government Cloud is coming later this year. Furthermore, Spectro Cloud announces that Palette VerteX brings full FIPS 140-2 cryptographic features to both the Palette platform and the Kubernetes clusters it deploys and manages, whether in traditional compute environments or at the edge. FIPS 140-2 is a key security baseline for many public and private sector organizations. "Palette VerteX is designed from the ground up with security in mind that permeates every aspect it touches, giving government IT, platform engineering, and security teams the confidence they need to deploy and manage any Kubernetes environment at scale,” said Matthew Appler, CEO, Corsec Security, Inc. Mission-ready support you can rely on Spectro Cloud is a US-headquartered company, with engineers located across the country, from California to Florida. Many are veterans or have spent their careers supporting defense and government IT organizations. As such Spectro Cloud is proud to offer a premium support tier, delivered exclusively by highly qualified US citizens on US soil, for agencies and departments that need it. The non-disruptive answer to budget shortfalls Together, the new features in the VerteX edition make Palette a compelling alternative to incumbent K8s management tooling, especially with its competitive and transparent usage-based pricing model. Palette presents a clear solution for organizations struggling with team resources and budgets. A recent study by analysts ESG found that Palette could cut operating hours and costs for a typical multi-cluster deployment by 90%. But adopting Palette doesn’t mean ‘rip and replace’ for customers already tied into multi-year agreements with other vendors. One of Palette’s greatest differentiators is its broad support for different Kubernetes distributions and environments, including its ability to monitor and manage clusters built on Rancher RKE2 and Red Hat OpenShift. Government organizations can leverage their existing investments while charting a course for modern Kubernetes, with openness as a core design principle in Palette VerteX. “The Palette VerteX announcement comes at a pivotal time in the public sector where managing Kubernetes across organizations using multiple cluster types, across multiple cloud and on-prem environments is very much a challenging reality,” said Josh Slattery, Vice President of Technology Sales at Vertosoft, the leading technology distributor focused on the public sector. “It’s great to see Spectro Cloud launch a truly mission-ready Kubernetes management solution for government straight out of the gate, and we are excited to see the impact it will have on our public sector customers.” Today’s announcement is the first step on Spectro Cloud’s government roadmap. Furthermore, Spectro Cloud is already working to make Palette the first multi-environment SaaS Kubernetes management platform to become FedRAMP Moderate certified. “Palette was built to be secure and mission-ready from the start, and over the past year we’ve seen a lot of interest from public sector organizations of all kinds,” said Kyle Goodwin, VP of Public Sector at Spectro Cloud. “Today, with the announcement of these important enhancements, Palette VerteX provides a genuine best-in-class experience for demanding agencies and departments looking to simplify, secure and scale their Kubernetes infrastructure. Our message to government is this: Spectro Cloud is here, and we’re ready to accelerate your mission.” About Spectro Cloud Spectro Cloud uniquely enables organizations to deploy and manage Kubernetes in production, at scale. Its Palette enterprise Kubernetes management platform gives platform engineering and DevOps teams effortless control of the full Kubernetes lifecycle even across multiple clouds, data centers, bare metal and edge environments. Ops teams are empowered to support their developers with curated Kubernetes stacks and tools based on their specific needs, with granular governance and enterprise-grade security.

Read More

Server Virtualization, Backup and Disaster Recovery

Tackle.io announces a collaboration with AWS to help ISVs accelerate revenue through Cloud go-to-market

prnewswire | July 27, 2023

Tackle.io, an end-to-end solution for B2B software companies to generate revenue through the cloud, announced today a collaboration with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to help independent software vendors (ISVs) accelerate their Cloud go-to-market (Cloud GTM) journey with AWS. This collaboration provides ISVs the software and services they need to scale with AWS by driving a complete go-to-market motion through co-sell and AWS Marketplace. Through this collaboration, AWS Partners will be able to capitalize on these opportunities by leveraging the Tackle Cloud GTM Platform for cloud buyer intent data, direct integrations with the AWS Partner Network Customer Engagement (ACE) program, tools for streamlining AWS Marketplace transactions, and integrated capabilities with Salesforce designed to further drive sales productivity and stronger relationships with AWS, leading to faster deal cycles and higher win rates. "Cloud marketplaces and co-sell have become the center of how ISVs go-to-market with AWS," said John Jahnke, CEO of Tackle. "We continue to innovate to help sellers build their Cloud GTM through a combination of product strategy, business strategy, services, and expert support, all with the goal of driving strategic revenue." This collaboration will uplift three key goals for ISVs as they scale: Training and enablement to spin the Cloud GTM flywheel - As Cloud GTM is a relatively new route to market for many ISVs, they benefit from expert guidance on how to build and scale their growth engine with AWS. Tackle's Strategic Services offer a variety of workshops, enablement, coaching, and managed services that delve into the intricacies of operationalizing a co-sell + AWS Marketplace motion, providing proven methodology, expertise, and best practices for participation in AWS Partner programs. AWS Marketplace excellence to drive co-sell transactions and revenue - ISV sales teams benefit from Tackle's cloud buyer intent data that helps identify the right accounts to co-sell with AWS, tools to streamline the creation, delivery, and tracking of AWS Marketplace private offers, as well as continuous support for new AWS functionality and features including direct AWS Marketplace sales, renewals and expansions, and channel sales via Channel Partner Private Offers (CPPO). Integration into your system of record to operationalize Cloud GTM - Tackle's Salesforce integration puts both co-sell operations and AWS Marketplace private offers in the hands of the ISV sales team so they can manage each opportunity from creation to co-sell to close all within their system of record to streamline manual processes and increase seller adoption. "It's great to see AWS and Tackle collaborating toward even better experiences for AWS Partners like us," said Michael Musselman, senior director, Technology & Strategic Alliances at Lacework. "We're excited to leverage Tackle to bring our co-sell and AWS Marketplace motions together and streamline that into Salesforce so our cloud alliance, operations, and sales teams can improve productivity and accelerate deals." "AWS continues to invest deeply in the AWS Partner experience to provide resources that allow ISVs to grow," said Chris Grusz, managing director, Technology Partnerships at AWS. "Our longstanding relationship with Tackle is a great enhancement of the AWS Partner experience as it directly supports partner scale by accelerating co-sell and AWS Marketplace growth through the Tackle platform and provides ISVs with the latest cloud GTM and co-sell expertise through workshops and coaching." About Tackle Tackle is a leading solution built to help software companies generate revenue through a data-driven Cloud go-to-market (Cloud GTM). Tackle works with more than 550 software companies including Auth0, CrowdStrike, HashiCorp, Lacework, New Relic, Snyk, VMware, and many more at every stage—from companies scaling their go-to-market to the largest software companies in the world. We are venture backed by three of the world's top SaaS investors—a16z, Bessemer Venture Partners, and Coatue—to execute on our mission to positively transform the way that software is sold.

Read More

Server Virtualization, Security

Versa Networks Showcasing SSE and Zero Trust Everywhere at Black Hat USA 2023

businesswire | August 07, 2023

Versa Networks, the recognized leader of single-vendor Unified Secure Access Service Edge (SASE), today announced it will demonstrate the latest in Unified SASE security and networking services at Black Hat USA 2023 next week. The company’s security and networking experts will be available during the event to meet with attendees and discuss the latest in applying tightly integrated SASE services to solve their complex secure networking needs. Exhibiting at Black Hat USA 2023 in Booth 1389, Versa will demonstrate three main solutions to protect branches and remote workers: Secure Internet Access (VSIA): This solution ensures secure internet access for branches and remote workers by offering a range of security features, including: Web Filtering (SWG) to control and monitor web traffic; SaaS Application Security (CASB) for securing cloud-based applications; Data Leak Security (DLP) to prevent unauthorized data leakage; Anti-virus and Intrusion Prevention to protect against known threats; Malware and Ransomware Protection to safeguard against malicious software; and BYOD Access Management to regulate personal devices accessing the network. Zero Trust Network Access (Zero Trust Everywhere, VSPA): This solution replaces traditional VPNs and adopts a Zero Trust approach to provide secure network access for branches and remote workers. Secure SD-WAN: This solution transforms branch networks by delivering software-defined networking with built-in security features. It includes: MPLS Replacement for more efficient and cost-effective network connections; and Next-Gen Firewall (NGFW), Intrusion Detection/Prevention Systems (IDS/IPS), and Unified Threat Management (UTM) features integrated within the SD-WAN solution. The company will also host a presentation by Vikram Phatak, CEO of CyberRatings.org, a non-profit member organization that provides transparency and expert guidance on cybersecurity risks through research and objective product testing, on Aug. 10 at 11 am PDT at Versa’s booth. Mr. Phatak will discuss testing initiatives for SD-WAN, SSE Threat Protection and ZTNA. Attendees will learn from his expertise in developing testing methodologies and performing in-depth evaluations. Versa’s AI/ML-powered single-vendor Unified SASE delivers organically developed best-of-breed functions that tightly integrate and deliver services via the cloud, on-premises, or as a blended combination of both, managed through a single pane of glass. Versa delivers SASE services such as Secure SD-WAN, Next-Generation Firewall, Next-Generation Firewall as a Service, Cloud Network Firewall, Unified Threat Management (UTM) including Advanced Threat Protection (ATP), Secure Web Gateway (SWG), Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA), Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB), Data Loss Prevention (DLP), Remote Browser Isolation (RBI), and User and Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA). Versa’s single-vendor Unified SASE platform goes above and beyond management console automation by providing the ability to integrate networks, points of presence, policy definitions, application definitions, agent logic, and data lakes. Versa simplifies how enterprises protect and connect their users, devices and sites to workloads and applications anywhere, anytime to improve security posture and enhance user-to-application experience and operational efficiency. Gartner has identifiedVersa SASE as having the most SASE components out of all 56 vendors Gartner evaluated and named Versa as one of the vendors delivering single-vendor SASE. Dell’Oro Group has namedVersa the Unified SASE market share leaderfor two years in a row, while 650 Group has recognizedVersa as the market share leaderfor both Deployed SASE and Enabled SD-WAN since 2020. Also, KuppingerCole Analysts AG named Versa a leader in every evaluation category in itsSASE Integration Suites Leadership Compassreport. In addition, Frost & Sullivan honored Versa with itsSASE Global Enabling Technology Leadership Awardfor its industry-leading SASE solution. Enterprise Management Associates (EMA) also found thatVersa SASE has the most SASE supported functions,while theCIO CHOICE 2023 Honor and Recognitionprogram distinguished Versa SASE as the Most Trusted Brand by CIOs for SASE. About Versa Networks Versa Networks, the leader in single-vendor Unified SASE platforms, delivers AI/ML-powered SSE and SD-WAN solutions. The platform provides networking and security with true multitenancy, and sophisticated analytics via the cloud, on-premises, or as a blended combination of both to meet SASE requirements for small to extremely large enterprises and Service Providers. Thousands of customers globally with hundreds of thousands of sites and millions of users trust Versa with their mission critical networks and security. Versa Networks is privately held and funded by Sequoia Capital, Mayfield, Artis Ventures, Verizon Ventures, Comcast Ventures, BlackRock Inc., Liberty Global Ventures, Princeville Capital, RPS Ventures and Triangle Peak Partners.

Read More

Spotlight

Safecoder is here! VMware, partnering with Hugging Face, has brought their open source code LLM: Starcoder on-premises as the "Safecoder" solution. Safecoder lets customers provide a highly capable coding assistant to their development teams while maintaining control over proprietary data. Plus, Safecoder provides capabilities to fine-tune the underlying model on proprietary code to learn your coding style and guidelines.

Resources