VMware to add BitFusion GPU Virtualization to HPC Capabilities

Inside HPC | November 27, 2019

In August 2019, VMware acquired BitFusion, a pioneer in the virtualization of hardware accelerated devices with a strong focus on GPU technology. BitFusion offers a software platform that decouples specific physical resources from the servers they are attached to in the environment. The acquisition of BitFusion will bolster VMware’s strategy of supporting AI- and ML-based workloads by virtualizing hardware accelerators. These accelerators can be used regardless of location in the environment – on-premises and/or in the cloud.

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
Virtual Desktop Tools, Virtual Server Infrastructure

European Commission Approves Broadcom's Acquisition of VMware

prnewswire | July 17, 2023

Broadcom Inc. a global technology leader that designs, develops and supplies semiconductor and infrastructure software solutions, received conditional approval today from the European Commission to complete its acquisition of VMware, Inc. (NYSE: VMW). With this decision, the Commission recognizes the importance of this combination in enabling enterprises to accelerate growth and momentum in the multi-cloud ecosystem, and in expanding customer choice and creating more potential for increased innovation and competition. Broadcom has also received legal merger clearance in Australia, Brazil, Canada, South Africa, and Taiwan, and foreign investment control clearance in all necessary jurisdictions. While Broadcom believes that its proposed acquisition of VMware will only increase competition and innovation in cloud computing, Broadcom provided the European Commission with a technology access remedy that preserves interoperability, a core principle that would not have changed as a result of this transaction. Broadcom did this to fully address the concerns expressed by the European Commission, and Broadcom welcomes the Commission's decision to accept this access remedy. Broadcom looks forward to continuing to work constructively with regulators around the world. Broadcom is confident that when regulators conclude their review, they too will see that the combination of Broadcom and VMware will enhance competition in the cloud and benefit enterprise customers by giving them more choice and control over where they locate their workloads. Broadcom continues to expect that the transaction will close in its fiscal year 2023. About Broadcom Inc. Broadcom Inc. (NASDAQ: AVGO), a Delaware corporation headquartered in San Jose, CA, is a global technology leader that designs, develops and supplies a broad range of semiconductor and infrastructure software solutions. Broadcom's category-leading product portfolio serves critical markets including data center, networking, enterprise software, broadband, wireless, storage and industrial. Our solutions include data center networking and storage, enterprise, mainframe and cyber security software focused on automation, monitoring and security, smartphone components, telecoms and factory automation.

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Virtual Desktop Tools, Server Hypervisors

RISC Zero raises $40m in Series A to bring its leading Zero-Knowledge technology to Web3 & Enterprise

prnewswire | July 20, 2023

RISC Zero, developer of leading general purpose zero-knowledge (ZK) virtual machine technology, has raised a $40 million Series A. The round was led by Blockchain Capital and joined by seed round lead Bain Capital Crypto, with participation from other notable investors including Galaxy Digital, IOSG, RockawayX, Maven 11, Fenbushi Capital, Delphi Digital, Aglaé Ventures, IOBC, Tribute Labs' Zero Dao, Figment Capital, and Alchemy Ventures. RISC Zero's mission is to equip developers and infrastructure providers with novel cryptographic tools to power the next generation of trustless, scalable, and decentralized computation; both on and off-chain — allowing them to build solutions that defy common assumptions about the capabilities of blockchains and other federated and cooperative computing systems. Our innovative system enables users to confidently take control of their digital world by ensuring computational integrity and producing indisputable receipts of accurate program execution. "Imagine a world where data privacy, security, and trust are no longer concerns, where software supply chains are transparent and verifiable, and where a new generation of applications can harness the power of zero-knowledge computing to solve some of the most pressing challenges of the digital age. This is the promise of zero-knowledge computing and the reason we are investing in RISC Zero" - Bart Stephens, Founder and Managing Partner at Blockchain Capital RISC Zero's ZK Virtual Machine (zkVM) enables developers to build ZK-powered applications with the convenience of conventional programming languages such as Rust and C++. Utilizing advanced features such as continuations, RISC Zero's zkVM can run programs of arbitrary complexity and scope while utilizing off-the-shelf computing platforms — a first in the blockchain industry. "We're honored to be supported by all of our incredible capital partners and the visionary leaders and teams that have signed on to help us build this revolution in computing capability. We're excited to play our part in building a more open and trusted foundation for the future of the internet." - Brian Retford, CEO & Co-founder This funding round will enable RISC Zero to bring its Bonsai computing platform to market, supporting rapid application development and deployment in both cloud and decentralized environments. With Bonsai, developers can focus on writing their application instead of worrying about the complexities of proof orchestration and server infrastructure. AboutRISC Zero The RISC Zero platform will drive the coming decentralized computing revolution. We are bringing general purpose computing to the zero-knowledge ecosystem – enabling users to trust programs run anywhere, while allowing developers to use the tools they already know and love. Public key cryptography ushered in the modern internet era by fundamentally altering digital trust dynamics. Similarly, zero-knowledge computing will radically alter the way we interact digitally and enable entirely new classes of applications.

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Server Hypervisors, Security

Discover the Gigamon Deep Observability Pipeline at VMware Explore 2023

businesswire | August 08, 2023

Gigamon, the leading deep observability company, today announced its participation at VMware Explore, VMware’s flagship multi-cloud event being held Aug. 21-24 in Las Vegas. More than 10,000 attendees are expected to attend the conference and can visit Gigamon at booth #319 to learn how GigaVUE Cloud Suite™, a VMware-certified deep observability pipeline, acquires, optimizes, and distributes traffic and network-derived intelligence from any virtual machine or container across leading cloud platforms to monitoring and security tools. As the complexity of hybrid cloud infrastructure continues to grow and organizations look to get the most out of their cloud investments, the deep observability market is forecasted to grow at a 52 percent CAGR and reach $1.9B by 2027. This growth is supported by the recentGigamon 2023 Hybrid Cloud Security Survey, in which nearly all respondents agree that today cloud security is dependent on gaining visibility across all data-in-motion (96%) and believe that deep observability is an important element of their cloud security (97%). By visiting Gigamon at booth #319, attendees will gain access to: Expertswho can highlight how theGigamon Deep Observability Pipelineworks within the VMware environment to harness actionable network-level intelligence to amplify the power of security and observability tools. Gigamon is scheduling live onsite demos in advance, and attendees can book a meeting using thislink. Daily rafflesfor a chance to win an Apple Watch or a Meta Data Quest 2 Virtual Reality Headset. Drawings will take place one hour before the Expo closes each day (Monday, Aug. 21 - Wednesday, Aug. 23). “As network blind spots continue to grow with increasing lateral and container communications, deep observability has emerged as the foundation for today’s effective security posture,” said Bassam Khan, vice president of product and technical marketing at Gigamon. “Working with VMware, we’ve certified our Gigamon Deep Observability Pipeline so mutual customers can gain visibility into all hybrid cloud traffic, regardless whether virtual, container, or multi-cloud, and better leverage their current tooling to secure their hybrid cloud infrastructure.” About Gigamon Gigamon®offers a deep observability pipeline that harnesses actionable network-level intelligence to amplify the power of observability tools. This powerful combination helps enable IT organizations to assure security and compliance governance, speed root-cause analysis of performance bottlenecks, and lower operational overhead associated with managing hybrid and multi-cloud IT infrastructure. The result: modern enterprises realize the full transformational promise of the cloud. Gigamon serves more than 4,000 customers worldwide, including over 80 percent of Fortune 100 enterprises, 9 of the 10 largest mobile network providers, and hundreds of governments and educational organizations worldwide.

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VPN

Internet Engineering Task Force standardises quantum-safe VPN protocol created by Post-Quantum

Businesswire | July 18, 2023

The world’s efforts to secure digital communications from the threat posed by quantum computers took a significant leap forward today as a new standard for quantum-safe Virtual Private Networks (VPN) was ratified by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). The new protocol has already been used by Banque de France and Deutsche Bundesbank to secure payments messages, paving the way for full adoption by the Bank for International Settlements to secure communications between the world’s central banks. ‘Harvest Now Decrypt Later’ (HNDL) attacks currently represent the greatest quantum cybersecurity threat. These attacks see hostile actors steal encrypted data now which can be decrypted once a sufficiently mature quantum computer comes online. The new US Quantum Computing Cybersecurity Preparedness Act states that the HNDL risk presents the highest threat to humankind and stipulates that quantum migration must start now. Deploying a VPN based on new post quantum cryptography is the easiest way to protect data-in-transit from such attacks. The new IETF standard specifies how VPNs can exchange communications securely in the quantum age. The novel approach prioritises interoperability by making it possible for multiple post-quantum and classical encryption algorithms to be incorporated into VPNs. Combining both old and new encryption is essential to ensure no disruption to the functioning of existing IT systems, and to protect data from attack by both classical and quantum computers. This is a particularly important milestone for internet connectivity and security as we are transitioning from an era where the world relied upon just one or two algorithms (RSA and Elliptic Curve), to a situation where different nation states are deploying a wide variety of different post-quantum algorithms. This new IETF standard is the glue that allows parties using different public key encryption algorithms to talk with one another. The new IETF standard was proposed and designed by Post-Quantum, a British cyber security company that’s built a portfolio of market-ready quantum-safe cyber security products. Post-Quantum’s own Hybrid PQ VPN uses the new IETF standard and is already in use by NATO to secure its communications from quantum attack, supporting interoperable communications between NATO members. CJ Tjhai, CTO, Post-Quantum and original author of the new IETF standard said: “I’d like to thank all the technologists that collaborated with us on this IETF standard. Much of the focus has been on NIST’s new post quantum encryption algorithms themselves, but this is insufficient unless you have a protocol that defines how the connectivity is done. The easiest way to prevent Harvest Now Decrypt Later attacks is to deploy a PQ VPN based on the new IETF standard. NIST’s new algorithms are only useful if we have agreed standards for their use and mature products that can accommodate them.” Andersen Cheng, Executive Chairman, Post-Quantum added: “CJ and his collaborators have completed important work that makes it possible for tech companies to build quantum-safe VPNs that communicate to one another. We are entering a period where different countries are now recommending different encryption algorithms, so engineering our communications infrastructure to be interoperable and backward compatible is absolutely crucial. That’s the value our own VPN is bringing to organisations like NATO, a diverse member organisation with a variety of post-quantum algorithms in use. “In the commercial sector, we are pleased that Banque de France and Deutsche Bundesbank have also recently completed their project in transmitting payment messages using our protocol, which will pave the way for the Bank for International Settlements to build a complete chain of trust for central bank applications to counter any HNDL risks they already face today.” José María Lucía Moreno, Lead Partner, EY Wavespace and a Post-Quantum partner added: “Our agreement with Post-Quantum is an important step in helping EY and its clients to become quantum-safe. We’re increasingly consulting with our clients to identify where they use traditional encryption that will need to be upgraded, and to help them prepare for the quantum era. Post-Quantum’s approach is particularly interesting because they have modular software-based products like the VPN, which can be implemented together, or as standalones within existing environments, to offer protection today.” The IETF is the non-profit organisation with responsibility for developing the standards that define how the internet is built and used. Now that the IETF has ratified this work, VPN providers will adapt their protocols to match it, making this a defining standard for the future of cybersecurity as the world transitions from classical to new post-quantum encryption. Ratification represents the culmination of work dating back to 2017 when Post-Quantum took the lead in creating the original proposal for this standard. About Post-Quantum Post-Quantum is upgrading the world to next-generation encryption. Our quantum-safe platform includes modular software for Identity, Transmission and Encryption that protect organisations across their entire digital footprint. Products are interoperable, backward compatible and crypto-agile - ensuring a smooth transition to the next generation of encryption. Post-Quantum works with organisations in defence, critical national infrastructure and financial services, including a multi-year relationship with NATO to ensure its communications are secure against quantum attack.

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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.

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