NSX 6.2 was released on August 20, 2015. One of the key features in NSX 6.2 is Cross vCenter Networking and Security. This new capability scales NSX vSphere across vCenter boundaries. Now, one can span logical networking and security constructs across vCenter boundaries irrespective of whether the vCenters are in adjacent racks or across datacenters (up to 150ms apart). This enables us to solve a variety of use cases including:

  • Capacity pooling across vCenters
  • Simplifying data center migrations
  • Cross vCenter and long distance vMotion
  • Disaster recovery

With Cross vCenter Networking & Security one can extend logical switches (VXLAN networks) across vCenter boundaries enabling a layer 2 segment to span across VCs even when the underlying network is a pure IP / L3 network. However, the big innovation here is that with NSX we can also extend distributed routing and distributed firewalling seamlessly across VCs to provide a comprehensive solution as seen in the figure below.

CROSS VC NETWORKING

Cross vCenter Networking & Security

Of course, there are a more details behind how this feature works and how we solve some really cool challenges in a simple elegant manner with network virtualization which we will cover  at VMworld 2015 in the session NET5989. In the meanwhile if you want to see this in action take a look at the demo on Cross vCenter Networking & Security.  

And if you want to give this a test drive at VMworld, Cross vCenter NSX will be a part of the VMworld Hands-on-labs. This feature is being covered in the NSX Advanced Labs (HOL-SDC-1625).

See you at VMworld!