Broadcom Unveils the Future of VMware Cloud Foundation

Rhea-AI Summary

Broadcom Inc. (NASDAQ: AVGO) unveiled VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) 9 at VMware Explore 2024 Las Vegas. VCF 9 aims to simplify the deployment, consumption, and operations of a secure and cost-effective private cloud. Key features include:

1. Unified operations and automation with a self-service cloud portal
2. Expanded VCF Import capabilities
3. Advanced Memory Tiering with NVMe for AI and data-intensive applications
4. Integrated multi-tenancy and native VPC deployment
5. Enhanced security management and data protection
6. Introduction of VCF Advanced Services

Broadcom also announced investments in a Private Cloud Modernization Program, including a Private Cloud Maturity Model, Jumpstart Program, new VCF certification, and free digital learning resources.

Positive

• VMware Cloud Foundation 9 aims to simplify private cloud deployment and operations, potentially reducing costs and improving efficiency
• VCF 9 introduces advanced features like memory tiering with NVMe, which could enhance performance for AI and data-intensive applications
• Introduction of VCF Advanced Services offers ready-to-deploy solutions, potentially accelerating innovation in private cloud environments
• Broadcom's investment in a Private Cloud Modernization Program may help customers optimize their cloud journey and maximize ROI

Negative

• None.

Insights

Tech Expert

Broadcom's unveiling of VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) 9 marks a significant leap in private cloud technology. The platform's unified approach addresses key pain points in enterprise IT, notably simplifying deployment and operations while enhancing security. The 34% lower infrastructure costs and 564% three-year ROI are particularly impressive, signaling strong potential for cost optimization.

The integration of AI capabilities, including the VMware Private AI Foundation with NVIDIA, positions VCF 9 at the forefront of enterprise AI adoption. This could be a game-changer for organizations looking to leverage AI while maintaining data sovereignty and security. The native VPC deployment and multi-tenancy features also stand out, potentially streamlining resource allocation and improving developer productivity.

Financial Analyst

From a financial perspective, VMware Cloud Foundation 9 presents a compelling value proposition. The reported 42% lower overall cost-of-operations and 10-month payback period are strong indicators of potential financial benefits for adopters. These efficiencies could translate into improved margins for Broadcom's VMware division.

The introduction of VCF Advanced Services creates a new revenue stream, potentially increasing customer lifetime value. However, investors should monitor adoption rates and the impact on Broadcom's revenue mix. The investment in customer education and certification programs, while initially a cost, could drive long-term customer retention and upselling opportunities, potentially boosting recurring revenue.

Market Research Analyst

VMware Cloud Foundation 9 appears well-positioned in the evolving private cloud market. The emphasis on unified operations, AI integration and enhanced security aligns with current enterprise IT trends. The platform's ability to support both VM and containerized applications caters to diverse customer needs, potentially expanding its market reach.

The Private Cloud Maturity Model and Jumpstart Program demonstrate Broadcom's commitment to customer success, which could be a key differentiator in a competitive market. However, the success of VCF 9 will likely depend on how effectively it can compete with public cloud offerings and other private cloud solutions. Monitoring customer adoption rates and satisfaction levels will be important in assessing its market impact.

VMware Cloud Foundation 9 will deliver a unified platform that simplifies the Deployment, Consumption and Operations of a Secure, Cost-effective Private Cloud

LAS VEGAS, Aug. 27, 2024 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- VMware Explore 2024 -- At VMware Explore 2024 Las Vegas, Broadcom Inc. (NASDAQ: AVGO) today unveiled VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) 9, the future of VCF that will accelerate customers’ transition from siloed IT architectures to a unified and integrated private cloud platform that lowers cost and risk. VMware Cloud Foundation 9 will radically simplify the deployment, consumption and operations of a secure and cost-effective private cloud.

VMware Cloud Foundation is the industry’s first private cloud platform to deliver public cloud scale and agility with private cloud security, resilience and performance, and low overall total cost of ownership. VCF supports customers’ digital innovation with faster infrastructure modernization, a unified cloud experience, and better cyber resiliency and platform security and low total cost of ownership.

A recent IDC Business Value study found that organizations interviewed for the study have used VCF to establish secure, agile, elastic, and cost-effective private and hybrid cloud infrastructures. The study found that with VMware Cloud Foundation, organizations not only optimize their infrastructure costs and staff time requirements, but positively affect business outcomes through more effective application development and enabling security teams to spend more time on improving security results. The interviews and analysis showed customers, compared to their environments before VCF, could achieve:

• 34% lower infrastructure costs and >50% infrastructure and security team efficiencies, resulting in 42% lower overall cost-of-operations¹
• 61% faster time to deploy new VMs, 50% faster for network capacity, and 32% faster for storage, resulting in an overall 564% three-year ROI and 10 months to payback¹

“To break the infrastructure silos, reclaim control of public cloud sprawl, and capture the opportunity for AI in the enterprise, our customers are shifting from best-of-breed siloed architectures to a modern private cloud platform,” said Krish Prasad, senior vice president and general manager, VCF Division at Broadcom. “VMware Cloud Foundation 9 will redefine the landscape for private cloud by delivering a modern, integrated platform that will unify operations and automation to deliver a cloud experience that enables businesses to be more innovative, efficient, resilient and secure.”

“At GCI, deploying VMware Cloud Foundation has fundamentally transformed how we deliver services across Alaska’s diverse landscape,” said Jeremy Mayfield, Senior Solutions Architect, Enterprise Cloud Platform Group at GCI Communication. “By standardizing our infrastructure on a unified private cloud platform, we’ve modernized our operations, significantly reducing deployment times from months to days. This shift enables us to respond faster to the unique needs of our remote communities while maintaining the highest levels of security and resilience.”

“Our customers are our membership. They have direct ownership in our organization, and they've got a vested, real interest in our success,” said Mark Fournier, Chief Information Officer, U.S. Senate Federal Credit Union. “VMware Private AI running on VMware Cloud Foundation will deliver tremendous value in allowing us to conform to how we've operated with a private cloud environment for years, allowing us to keep pace with that relentless pursuit of innovation. We see AI in customer service as a powerful use case—from knowledge base-powered chatbot answers to our internal staff, all the way to delivering financial answers to our members on whatever device they use for banking.”

Making it Faster, Easier, to Deploy and Operate Modern Infrastructure
To help customers modernize their infrastructure, VMware Cloud Foundation 9 will deliver capabilities that enable their infrastructure to operate as a single unified and automated system, helping customers keep pace with modern app requirements, and bring the advanced VMware capabilities they already have from Broadcom into their private cloud platform.

Unified Operations and Automation: VMware Cloud Foundation 9 will feature a self-service cloud portal for provisioning services, and reduce the total number of management consoles from more than a dozen to just a single console each for operations and automation. New integrated workflows will simplify the transition between operations and automation tasks, and enhanced insights and analytics will enable even more proactive management.

Expanded VCF Import: VCF Import helps organizations transition quickly to a modern and integrated infrastructure by reducing the complexity and downtime associated with manual migrations of existing environments into the VCF private cloud platform. With VMware Cloud Foundation 9, Broadcom will add the ability for customers to import VMware NSX, VMware vDefend, VMware Avi Load Balancer and more complex storage topologies into existing VCF environments, and leverage and integrate older versions of existing infrastructure. A new intuitive UI will further simplify management and deployment.

Advanced Memory Tiering with NVMe: This new memory tiering capability will significantly enhance data-intensive applications, such as AI, databases and real-time analytics. AI workloads, especially those involving large datasets and complex models, demand rapid data retrieval and processing. Memory tiering using NVMe reduces latency and accelerates data throughput, which is crucial for training and inference tasks. Additionally, the cost-efficiency of tiering helps manage the high storage demands of AI applications, enabling scalable solutions that maintain performance without excessive expenses.

Delivering a Cloud Experience that Provides Frictionless Consumption of Resources
VMware Cloud Foundation 9 will expose easy-to-consume infrastructure services that enable developers and application owners to deploy any application (VM or containerized) without friction. VCF will support:

Integrated VCF Multi-Tenancy: VMware Cloud Foundation 9 will bring multi-tenant capabilities previously provided separately by VMware Cloud Director into the VCF platform. Enterprise IT teams will then be able to support different organizations, business groups or development teams on the same shared infrastructure, while allowing application owners and development teams to segment their infrastructure based on their specific requirements for access, workload management, security and privacy.

Native VPC Deployment: VMware Cloud Foundation 9 will deliver the next evolution of VPCs as a native networking-as-a-service experience for VCF customers to increase developer productivity, reduce operational burden on IT, and enable faster provisioning of workloads and applications. Native VPC capabilities will simplify networking by enabling users to access self-service isolated connectivity without VLAN complexities and enable non-disruptive integration with existing networks. Native VPCs can be further enhanced through Advanced Services such as VMware vDefend to enable security groups and VMware Avi Load Balancer to enable one-click deployment of load-balancing as a service with VPC deployment.

Accelerated Adoption of VMware Private AI Foundation with NVIDIA: Aimed at enterprises looking to harness the power of AI while maintaining the benefits of a private cloud, VMware Private AI Foundation with NVIDIA offers a comprehensive solution for deploying, managing, and scaling AI-driven applications securely and efficiently on VCF-based private clouds. With VMware Cloud Foundation 9, Broadcom will deliver new VMware Private AI Foundation with NVIDIA capabilities that further simplify GenAI deployments such as vGPU profile visibility, GPU reservations, data indexing and retrieval service, and an AI agent builder service.

Enabling Uninterrupted Operations, Cyber Resilience, and Compliance
VMware Cloud Foundation 9 will enable fleet-level operations and centralized security and compliance management to deliver uninterrupted operations and more proactive risk mitigation. Enhancements to VMware Cloud Foundation as well as Advanced Services will include:

Unified VCF Security Management: Through native capabilities for Security Operations (SecOps) in VCF, customers will be able to enhance overall security posture while ensuring operational efficiency is maintained by managing across their entire global fleet of VCF deployments. A centralized information hub will provide timely and accurate security data in one place and a new comprehensive security view will provide visibility into multiple facets of security. Configuration drift detection will correlate and proactively notify IT of inconsistencies in system configurations across an entire VCF fleet.

Native vSAN-to-vSAN Data Protection with Deep Snapshots: vSAN remote snapshot replication will strengthen data resilience with a deep history of immutable snapshots, reduce downtime with enterprise-grade DR orchestration, and simplify the management experience with a unified appliance. It also supports vSAN disaggregated storage for increased scalability and storage efficiency. Customers can leverage the deep, immutable vSAN snapshots to recover from ransomware attacks with an on-premises Isolated Recovery Environment. This complements the existing cloud-based ransomware recovery offering to provide greater choice and flexibility to customers who want to preserve data sovereignty and unlock the value of the full VCF stack to protect workloads anywhere.

Advancing Cyber Threat Prevention: vDefend will expand to deliver new capabilities such as distributed firewall rule impact analysis to help simplify micro-segmentation security policy operations; distributed intrusion detection and prevention (IDPS) enhancements to support large, dense and multi-instance VCF environments; rapid threat assessment to help harden security posture by enabling threat profiling of VCF environments; and on-premises malware prevention for regulated organizations that require air-gapped deployment of VCF. Project Cypress will deliver GenAI-based intelligent assistance to help IT security teams proactively triage sophisticated threat campaigns and recommend remediation options.

Introducing VMware Cloud Foundation Advanced Services
Today, Broadcom is also introducing VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) Advanced Services, a robust catalog of ready-to-deploy solutions, enabling customers to accelerate innovation in their private cloud environments. This diverse library of private cloud solutions are similar to what enterprises have come to expect in the public cloud, allowing them to access the tools and technologies they need to rapidly address a variety of use cases and business opportunities. Whether customers use VCF Advanced Services on their own or with the help of a certified VMware Partner, each solution is fully vetted by Broadcom, with prescriptive architectural guidance to help speed deployment and time to value. Details on the complete catalog of services are available here.

Broadcom Invests in Private Cloud Modernization Program to Guide Customers' Cloud Journey
Recognizing that there are many paths and steps to implementing a private cloud, Broadcom is investing extensively to help guide and support customers through the process.

Private Cloud Maturity Model: designed to help customers assess their private and hybrid cloud capabilities across operations, processes and technology, the Private Cloud Maturity Model includes a Private Cloud Framework, an assessment resulting in a Private Cloud Maturity Index Score, and prescriptive guidance from Broadcom that helps customers chart a path forward for their ideal private cloud.

Jumpstart Program: Jumpstart Workshops help customers review their private cloud goals against their current cloud maturity level, evaluate their current architecture against their private cloud goals, and provide a tailored adoption plan to achieve the customers’ private cloud objectives. Leveraging the results of the Private Cloud Maturity Model assessment, VCF Jumpstart workshops enable customers to work with Broadcom to maximize technology investments faster by identifying improvement opportunities and developing actionable recommendations.

New VMware Cloud Foundation Certification: Broadcom’s new VMware Cloud Foundation certification exam allows IT teams to acquire in-demand skills aligned with current technology trends, make the transition to private cloud, reduce cloud costs, optimize resource usage, and maximize their VMware Cloud Foundation investment.

Free Digital Learning and Instructor-led Training: VCF customers now have unlimited complimentary access to the comprehensive VMware Cloud Foundation digital training library as well as instructor-led training to upskill and reskill teams via continuous learning. Investing in upskilling ensures teams understand VMware Cloud Foundation in depth, resulting in better efficiency, increased productivity, and faster ROI. VCF proficiency also empowers IT professionals to serve as experienced cloud advocates and drive proactive private cloud adoption among various teams within their organization.

1- IDC White Paper, sponsored by VMWare by Broadcom, The Business Value of VMware Cloud Foundation, doc #US52312224, August 2024

For the latest news and more from VMware Explore, the industry’s essential cloud event, visit the VMware Explore 2024 Las Vegas media kit.

Additional Resources

• For more details read these blogs
• Learn more about VMware Cloud Foundation
• Follow VMware Cloud Foundation social channels on LinkedIn, X, formerly known as Twitter and YouTube
  

About Broadcom
Broadcom Inc. (NASDAQ: AVGO) is a global technology leader that designs, develops, and supplies a broad range of semiconductor, enterprise software and security solutions. Broadcom's category-leading product portfolio serves critical markets including cloud, data center, networking, broadband, wireless, storage, industrial, and enterprise software. Our solutions include service provider and enterprise networking and storage, mobile device and broadband connectivity, mainframe, cybersecurity, and private and hybrid cloud infrastructure. Broadcom is a Delaware corporation headquartered in Palo Alto, CA. For more information, go to www.broadcom.com.

Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

This release contains forward-looking statements, including statements as to the anticipated benefits, features, competitiveness and customer acceptance of VCF 9, that are based on our current expectations and beliefs, assumptions made by and information currently available to our management, current market trends and market conditions and that involve risks and uncertainties, many of which are outside our control and may cause actual results to differ materially from those statements. Accordingly, you should not place undue reliance on such statements.

Our recent filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including Broadcom’s most recent reports on Forms 10-K and 10-Q, include these and other factors that may affect our business, results of operations and financial condition. We undertake no intent or obligation to publicly update or revise any of the estimates and other forward-looking statements made in this announcement, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law.

Roger T. Fortier
Broadcom, Inc.
roger.fortier@broadcom.com
+1.408.348.1569

FAQ

What is VMware Cloud Foundation 9 and when was it announced by Broadcom (AVGO)?

VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) 9 is a unified private cloud platform announced by Broadcom Inc. (AVGO) on August 27, 2024, at VMware Explore 2024 in Las Vegas. It aims to simplify deployment, consumption, and operations of secure and cost-effective private clouds.

What are the key features of VMware Cloud Foundation 9 announced by Broadcom (AVGO)?

Key features of VCF 9 include unified operations and automation, expanded VCF Import capabilities, advanced memory tiering with NVMe, integrated multi-tenancy, native VPC deployment, enhanced security management, and the introduction of VCF Advanced Services.

How does Broadcom (AVGO) plan to support customers in adopting VMware Cloud Foundation 9?

Broadcom (AVGO) is investing in a Private Cloud Modernization Program, which includes a Private Cloud Maturity Model, Jumpstart Program, new VCF certification, and free digital learning resources to guide and support customers through their private cloud journey.

What benefits does Broadcom (AVGO) claim VMware Cloud Foundation 9 will bring to customers?

Broadcom (AVGO) claims VCF 9 will deliver a unified platform that simplifies private cloud deployment, lowers costs and risks, improves security and resilience, and enables faster infrastructure modernization and application development.