VMware announced VMware Cloud Foundation 4.2. The release features updates to help customers further improve the storage, networking, management and security of large-scale virtual machine and container deployments on the platform. VMware also announced the availability of the vSAN Data Persistence platform, including Cloudian HyperStore and MinIO Object Storage plug-ins. Together, these offerings provide a unified, hybrid cloud-ready storage platform for modern and traditional applications with operational consistency and simplicity.

New VMware Cloud Foundation Release Delivers Broad Platform Enhancements

VMware Cloud Foundation 4.2 introduces new features and enhancements to further help customers deliver developer-ready infrastructure, scale their infrastructure without compromise and simplify operations. This new release features:

• vSAN Data Persistence platform: Manage S3-compatible object storage for unstructured data with the industry-leading HCI platform via support for Cloudian and MinIO offerings.
• vSAN HCI Mesh: Software-based approach for disaggregation of compute and storage resources. It helps customers reduce CAPEX by sharing capacity across vSAN clusters. It also lowers OPEX by reducing the amount of storage resources managed through efficient scaling.
• NSX-T 3.1 Federation: Cloud-like operating model for network administrators, simplifying the consumption of networking and security constructs. This includes centralized management, consistent networking and policy configuration with enforcement, and synchronized operational state across large-scale federated NSX-T deployments. With NSX-T Federation, customers can use stretched networks and unified security policies that span multi-region VMware Cloud Foundation deployments, providing workload mobility and simplifying disaster recovery.
• SDDC Manager Security Hardening: Secure communications between SDDC Manager and underlying components to minimize threats to VMware Cloud Foundation during all operational phases.

VMware Cloud Foundation 4.2 is expected to become available in VMware's Q1 FY22. Read more about VMware Cloud Foundation 4.2.

A Closer Look at VMware vSAN Data Persistence Platform

Unveiled in September 2020, the vSAN Data Persistence platform is a framework for ISVs to integrate modern stateful services, like object storage and NoSQL databases, with the underlying infrastructure. Through co-engineering efforts with partners, such as Cloudian and MinIO, the platform enables customers to run their stateful services with increased agility, lower TCO and simplified operations and management. In conjunction with partners, the platform enables customers to:

• Allow developers to use Kubernetes APIs to provision and scale stateful services on-demand in a self-service model with minimal administrator intervention.
• Deliver integrated service health and capacity monitoring through dedicated dashboards in VMware vCenter Server.
• Leverage service-aware infrastructure operations to enable service availability during infrastructure changes, including maintenance and lifecycle management.
• Run stateful services with optimal storage efficiency.
  

VMware offers customers two different deployment options for the platform:

• Standard vSAN Deployment: A fast and convenient way to get started running stateful services on vSAN. Customers can run stateful services and traditional apps on the same vSAN cluster to optimize resource utilization. Customers can select the vSAN Support for Shared Nothing Architecture (vSAN-SNA) storage policy to use the availability features that come with stateful service and turn off replication in the vSAN layer for space savings.
• vSAN Direct Configuration: Deploy stateful service on hardware optimized for application needs and use the availability, efficiency and security features built into the stateful service layer. Additionally, it provides access to the underlying direct-attached hardware for optimal storage efficiency and near bare metal performance. It also supports hardware on the vSAN Hardware Compatibility List (HCL). In addition, VMware provides recommended hardware configurations that are tested and validated by VMware, Cloudian, MinIO and select OEM partners for use cases of capacity-optimized object storage and performance-optimized object storage.
  

In both scenarios, vCenter helps customers benefit from unified storage management for modern and traditional apps. Read more about the vSAN Data Persistence Platform here and the partner solutions here.

Object Store Offerings on VMware Cloud Foundation with Tanzu Now Available

Cloudian HyperStore and MinIO Object Storage are both available for VMware Cloud Foundation with Tanzu through the vSAN Data Persistence platform integration. VMware and its partners enable customers to deploy object stores directly from vCenter in a few clicks. Customers can now use:

• Cloudian HyperStore: An enterprise-class, infinitely scalable, multi-tenant storage solution with military-grade security, geo-distribution and fully native S3 compatibility that supports both modern and traditional applications from a single platform. Learn more about Cloudian.
• MinIO High Performance Object Storage: A high-performance, Kubernetes-native, S3 compatible object store, MinIO is designed to deliver exceptional scale, security, resilience and throughput across a range of workloads including AI/ML, analytics, archival and cloud-native web/mobile applications. Learn more about MinIO.
  

Customers can purchase the object storage offerings directly from Cloudian and MinIO.