At VMworld, we announced the next-generation hybrid DaaS architecture of VMware Horizon, which will eventually become the single platform on which all Horizon environments are built, regardless of whether they run natively in the cloud or on VMware SDDC. This next-gen platform leverages a new concept called the Horizon Edge that moves most of the Horizon infrastructure components that traditionally run in a customer environment to the Horizon Control Plane, resulting in significantly lower infrastructure costs for customers and increasing our ability to deliver a comprehensive cloud service.
Today we’re excited to say that we’ve reached the next milestone in our process of delivering the lowest-cost, most scalable version of Horizon that we’ve ever made: Limited Availability.
What is Limited Availability?
Limited Availability (LA) is a phase of our software release cycle that means the next-generation Horizon Cloud service is a production-ready service that is fully supported by VMware and ready for customer consumption by select, qualified customers. It’s a step on the path towards General Availability, and since it’s fully supported by VMware it can be used for production environments.
As mentioned at VMworld, the initial releases of the next-gen platform will focus on Horizon Cloud on Microsoft Azure. Beyond that, qualification is done on a per-customer basis, so if you’re interested, reach out to your VMware rep.
What’s in this Limited Availability release?
At VMworld, we talked about how the future of VMware Horizon was focused on five main pillars:
- Lower costs
- Unprecedented Scalability
- Advanced Automation
- Improved Visibility and Troubleshooting
- Seamless Hybrid and Multi-Cloud Experience
This initial release is focused on lower costs, unprecedented scalability, and automation. Soon you’ll start to see us introduce the other concepts. Let’s take a look at each.
Lower Costs
By removing the need to deploy as much infrastructure in a customer environment, operational costs are significantly reduced. This cost reduction is further amplified by significant gains in scalability.
Unprecedented Scalability
Today, Horizon Cloud pods support 2,000 users per Azure subscription, and when additional users are needed, a new pod and Azure subscription must be created, increasing costs and time to deploy.
With the next-gen platform, 20,000 users will be supported by a single Horizon Edge deployment, resulting in fewer Azure subscriptions and even more operational cost reduction! Plus, additional capacity can be added in just a few seconds, which means customer time to value is much faster.
Advanced Automation
APIs are at the core of the next-generation of VMware Horizon, which means customers and partners will have the ability to build products, services, and automations around Horizon to support Day 1 and Day 2 operations like never before.
Improved Visibility and Troubleshooting
By moving more features into the Horizon Control Plane, VMware will be able to offer customers improved visibility, troubleshooting, and reporting. We’ll also be able to proactively alert you of potential issues so you can resolve them before they affect productivity.
Seamless Hybrid and Multi-Cloud Experience
Through the Horizon Control Plane, VMware is already a leader at unifying the management of hybrid and multi-cloud environments. With the next-gen platform, we intend to strengthen our position by unifying the infrastructure on which Horizon environments run. This will deliver the ultimate end-user and administration experience that brings desktop virtualization into the modern era.
Next Steps
We’re very excited to make this next-gen platform available, and over the next few weeks we’ll be digging deeper into the nuts and bolts of it. Stay tuned to the VMware EUC Blogs and VMware Tech Zone! In the meantime, check out these resources:
- Next-gen Horizon Announcement Blog
- VMworld Session: Technical Deep Dives on SASE and Horizon with Shawn Bass and Shikha Mittal
- VMworld Session: VMware Horizon Cloud: Update and Sneak Peek at the Next Evolution of Horizon with Shikha Mittal and Jerrid Cunniff
