Concerns about the impact of Broadcom's acquisition of VMware are still prevalent as VMware Explore 2024 kicks off. Here's the latest from the event. Credit: Henrik Elmsjö VMware Explore 2024 attendees saw an emphasis on private AI and cloud repatriation as key strategies for enterprises. The conference in Las Vegas, the first after Broadcom finalized its acquisition of VMware, highlighted the growing trend of companies bringing workloads back from public clouds to on-premises environments. Broadcom continued the theme on the European leg of VMware Explore, held Nov. 4-7 in Barcelona, where executives emphasized the company’s flagship private cloud platform, VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF). Broadcom also announced VeloRAIN, a new networking architecture that uses AI/ML to improve the performance and security of distributed AI workloads. Here’s the latest VMware Explore 2024 news and analysis: Broadcom EMEA CTO talks up private cloud, VCF updates Nov. 12, 2024: Focus, innovation and investment are key to positioning VMware technology in customer sights, said Joe Baguley, Broadcom’s chief technology officer for EMEA, in an interview with Computerworld Spain at VMware Explore Barcelona. “When it comes to building private clouds, we are the first. There is no one who can offer you a profile as broad and complete as ours.” VMware VeloRAIN uses AI/ML to improve network performance Nov. 5, 2024: VMware by Broadcom has unveiled a networking architecture that it says will improve the performance and security of distributed AI workloads. Launched at the VMware Explore conference in Barcelona, Spain, VeloRAIN can detect AI applications using AI and ML, even if the application traffic is encrypted, to enable QoS and QoE for edge AI applications, the company said. It will offer channel estimation intelligence for wireless connections over cellular or satellite to help enable what Broadcom called “fiber-like QoS in the face of dynamically changing network conditions.” Broadcom launches VMware Tanzu Data Services Nov. 5, 2024: Broadcom released VMware Tanzu Data Services, a new “advanced service” for VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF), at VMware Explore Barcelona. According to a release, the new offerings will be delivered through the private cloud and provide built-in data management services. VMware’s AI query tool could be best for junior threat team members Nov. 5, 2024: Don’t expect the earth to move when Broadcom’s VMware launches its new AI query tool for the vDefend platform early next year, says an industry analyst. “They seem to be making pragmatic promises,” Fernando Montenegro of Omdia said of the announcement that the AI-powered Intelligent Assist will be available in the first quarter of 2025. It is now in beta trials with customers. “It’s nice that they’re being cautious about it” instead of making wild promises that the genAI assistant will drastically improve security, he said. Broadcom bolsters VMware Cloud Foundation Nov. 1, 2024: VMware increased the vSAN capacity in vSphere Foundation by 2.5x to 250 GiB per core, which the company says will offer customers a more powerful hyperconverged infrastructure offering for running virtual machines and containers. Broadcom’s vision for VMware highlights private clouds, private AI Aug. 30, 2024: A year ago, VMware’s big annual VMware Explore conference was all about generative AI – specifically, about companies running AI applications within a hybrid cloud infrastructure. This year, attendees heard more about VMware’s partnership with Nvidia to deliver generative AI models and tools – but in the context of a private cloud. Broadcom CEO pushes on-prem private clouds Aug. 29, 2024: In a keynote address at VMware Explore 2024, Broadcom CEO Hock Tan talked up the new version of VMware Cloud Foundation and extolled the future of the enterprise: “private cloud, private AI, your own private data.” VMware Cloud Foundation gains AI model store, other updates Aug. 28, 2024: Some companies are looking to third-party AI platforms that don’t lock them into any one particular AI vendor or cloud provider, and VMware – now owned by Broadcom – is one of the leading contenders for the job. Today, at the annual VMware Explore conference, Broadcom sweetened the deal, announcing support for a new model store for the VMware Private AI Foundation with Nvidia add-on to its VMware Cloud Foundation 9 platform. With Project Cypress, VMware brings generative AI to cyberdefense Aug. 27, 2024: At the VMware Explore conference this week, VMware announced the addition of a generative AI tool, called Project Cypress, to its own vDefend cybersecurity platform. “Security teams get overwhelmed with a large number of threat campaigns and false alarms,” says Umesh Mahajan, vice president and general manager for application networking and security at Broadcom. “Project Cypress, via a natural language interface, helps triage and investigate high-risk threat campaigns faster, explains a particular threat campaign with additional context needed for the security team to quickly take appropriate actions, recommends remediation options, and can enforce the remediation option selected by the security team via vDefend’s threat prevention capabilities.” VMware upgrades software-defined edge for AI workloads Aug. 27, 2024: VMware has added connectivity options and traffic-management capabilities to its software-defined edge products to better support generative AI workloads. Edge computing will play a “pivotal role” in the deployment of AI applications, according to IDC, which expects spending on edge computing to reach $232 billion in 2024, an increase of 15.4% over 2023. Customer concerns loom as VMware Explore event approaches Aug. 19, 2024: Enterprise customers have questions about VMware’s future direction, licensing changes, and product roadmap following Broadcom’s takeover. Customers want to continue to see innovation across the VMware portfolio, says one analyst. They also want to see Broadcom focus on integration, interface design, and an easier adoption path. VMware Explore 2023 Generative AI dominates VMware Explore 2023 news Aug. 25, 2023: Highlights include a private AI platform developed with Nvidia that lets enterprises run generative AI applications on their proprietary data within VMware’s hybrid cloud infrastructure. VMware Cloud gains faster ransomware recovery, expanded management capabilities Aug. 22, 2023: Among the announcements at the VMware Explore conference is a new IBM-managed service based on VMware Cloud editions. VMware NSX+ centralizes cloud networking and security for multicloud environments Aug. 22, 2023: VMware NSX+ is a new cloud-managed service that enables consistent network operations and centralized security policy creation and enforcement in multicloud environments. VMware combines SASE and edge management in new orchestration platform Aug. 22, 2023: News from the VMware Explore conference includes a unified management platform for VMware’s SASE and edge computing stack, along with a new managed private mobile networking service. VMware, Nvidia team on enterprise-grade AI platform Aug. 22, 2023: VMware Private AI Foundation with Nvidia will enable enterprises to customize models and run generative AI applications on their own infrastructure in their data centers, at the edge, and in their clouds. SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe