Last week, thousands of customers, partners, and thought-leaders joined together virtually from around the world for VMworld 2020. With all the opportunities VMworld had to offer, we wanted to share our top takeaways for the cloud management community.
The theme for VMworld 2020 was “Together, Anything is Possible,” which couldn’t be more relevant, given thousands of customers, partners, and thought-leaders joined together virtually from around the world to rethink what’s possible with the power of technology.
The virtual format offered hundreds of sessions, expert keynotes, new product announcements, and fun activities ranging from puppy therapy to a live performance from John Legend. With all the opportunities VMworld had to offer, we wanted to share our top takeaways for the cloud management community.
VMware vision and innovation
VMware CEO, Pat Gelsinger, kicked off day one with a keynote focused on building a digital foundation for an unpredictable world. Pat outlined five critical building blocks—app modernization, multicloud, digital workspace, virtual cloud network, and intrinsic security—that will help our customers accelerate digital transformation. The learning tracks for VMworld were organized by each of these categories for deeper learning into each one. You can see the session on demand.
Product updates and announcements
VMworld 2020 showcased new VMware innovations to help businesses advance their digital transformation.
CloudHealth Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Support
CloudHealth announced general availability for Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) support. CloudHealth for OCI extends CloudHealth’s multicloud management to OCI customers by providing visibility into the cost and usage of OCI resources.
New Capabilities for CloudHealth Secure State
We shared several new features and enhancements to CloudHealth Secure State (formerly VMware Secure State) to help organizations operationalize cloud security with better visibility, simplified governance, and scalability. Updates include:
- Google Cloud support for comprehensive multicloud security posture management
- More than 20 new AWS and Azure services, including Kubernetes and serverless support
- General availability for Projects, which improves collaboration between security and developer teams
- Custom compliance frameworks to benchmark customized security standards
- Azure remediation support to build security guardrails and automate actions
- Open source remediation jobs for community members to collaborate and scale security
SaltStack Acquisition
VMware revealed plans to acquire intelligent IT automation company SaltStack. In an article released last week, Ajay Singh, Senior Vice President and General Manager of VMware’s Cloud Management Business Unit, said “VMware is acquiring SaltStack to significantly broaden its software configuration management and infrastructure and network automation capabilities.”
Additionally, Alex Wang, Vice President of Corporate Development at VMware, summarized how SaltStack will fit into VMware’s current solutions: “To get our customers to the cloud, we offer VMware HCX, which allows customers to literally mass migrate thousands of vSphere workloads in a short amount of time. Customers can automate infrastructure across clouds with VMware vRealize, and the next logical step was to enable more seamless onboarding and better cross-cloud orchestration with configuration management. This is what we are getting with SaltStack.”
Visit the VMworld website for the full list of announcements.
Joined by our customers and partners
Several CloudHealth customers and partners joined us to share their successes and best practices, including Groupware Technology, GE Digital, William Hill, and RSA.
You can watch the recorded sessions here:
- Groupware Technology: A Practical Guide for Managing Cloud Reservations and Discounts
- GE Digital: Best Practices for Cloud Financial Management
- William Hill: Best Practices for Optimizing Your Hybrid and Multicloud Environment
- RSA: How RSA Security Engineering Helps DevOps Teams Manage Public Cloud Security Risk
Missed a session? You can catch up on over 700 sessions on demand on the VMworld On Demand Video Library.
Up in the clouds
The CTO Perspective: Multicloud Management in a Volatile World
With unpredictable customer demand, increasingly diverse environments, and decentralized decision-making, cloud management has never been more critical or more challenging than it is today. VMware VP and CTO, Joe Kinsella, and VMware CMBU VP and CTO, Mike Wookey, discussed the evolving nature of public and hybrid cloud management and VMware’s vision for helping our customers overcome challenges to unlock agility, innovation, and efficiency in the cloud. See the recap article: A Volatile World Requires a New Approach to Cloud Management
VMware Cloud Business Office: Our Secret Weapon to Tame Multicloud
The Cloud Business Office (CBO) is the central enabler for organizations to manage multiple public clouds—efficiently and consistently. The VMware CBO governs all three major public clouds at VMware, covering cloud engineering, compliance and risk, community building, vendor relations, service owners, information security, cloud governance and cost operations, cloud finance, and training.
At VMworld, we had the opportunity to hear from the Director of the CBO, Cathal Cleary, and Senior Cloud Services Architect, Joe Keegan, about the strategy VMware IT used to build the CBO, what its priorities are, how the team is structured, and how solutions like CloudHealth and Secure State support its goals. See the full session on-demand: VMware Cloud Business Office: Our Secret Weapon to Tame Multicloud
A CBO, also known as a Cloud Center of Excellence (CCoE), Cloud Strategy Office, or Cloud Program Office, is critical to helping an organization improve their cloud maturity and drive best practices across business functions. Learn more about how to set up a CCoE in your organization and move up the cloud maturity curve in our whitepaper: Benchmark Your Cloud Maturity: A Framework for Best Practices
