vSphere

We’re pleased to announce that vSphere 7.0 is generally available to VMware Cloud Providers as of April 2, 2020. This is a monumental release featuring key enhancements to vSphere that provides you, VMware Cloud Providers, with the only true hybrid-cloud platform with integrated HCI and cloud mobility.

What’s New in vSphere 7

The new release of vSphere delivers tremendous value today and lays the ground work for some of the biggest updates to vSphere in years. We understand there’s tremendous interest in the integrated VM and container management capabilities, so see below on how those features are coming to VMware Cloud Foundation users first. For those of you not ready for VCF and waiting on the container features to be made more readily available, there are a number of key updates to vSphere 7.

What’s new for cloud providers:

  • Simplified upgrades with Lifecycle Manager
  • Intrinsic security with vSphere Trust Authority and identity federation
  • Application acceleration with enhancements in DRS and vMotion for large and business critical workloads

Core vSphere features:

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vSphere 7 includes many enhancements beyond Kubernetes:

  • vSphere Lifecycle Manager
    • Next-gen Infrastructure Image Management – Patch, update or upgrade your ESXi clusters using a desired state model
    • vCenter Server Profiles – Desired state configuration management capabilities allow you to define, validate, and apply configurations for multiple vCenter Servers
    • vCenter Server Update Planner – Manage compatibility and interoperability for vCenter Server and plan upgrades with generated interoperability and pre-checks report
    • Content Library – Administrative control and versioning support for effective centralized management for VM templates, virtual appliances, ISO images, and scripts
  • Identity federation with Active Directory Federation Services (ADFS) – Secure access and account management
  • vSphere Trust Authority – Remote attestation for sensitive workloads
  • Dynamic DirectPath IO – Support for vGPU and DirectPath I/O initial VM placement
  • DRS – Redesigned with a more workload centric approach, DRS balances resources allocated to workloads in a vSphere cluster
  • vMotion – The recent enhancements in vMotion logic provides non-disruptive operations

vSphere 7 powers a holistic reinvention of the entire VMware Cloud suite

vSphere is a cloud platform and supports associated technologies, such as vSAN, containers, automation capabilities, networking, and more. Here are the enhancements to the surrounding capabilities.

Deeper integration with VMware vSAN

By upgrading to vSphere 7, you can take advantage of the new features, performance, and capabilities in vSAN 7, such as native file storage, cloud-native storage, and persistent volumes. vSAN remains a separate licensed product.

Integrated Container and VM Management with VMware Cloud Foundation

Not available in vSphere 7 standalone, but with the soon-to-be released VMware Cloud Foundation 4 and the vSphere with Kubernetes add-on, cloud providers can build, run, and manage containers and VMs within a single cloud operating model. Developers and IT can drive faster innovation through modern applications. If interested in vSphere with Kubernetes, be sure to check out the VMware Cloud Foundation blog for details around the upcoming release.

Improved automation

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vSphere 7 supports tools that can be used to orchestrate provisioning and provide capabilities for self-service catalogs, governance, provisioning, orchestration and DevOps-based service delivery. These tools include, but are not limited to, Terraform, ServiceNow ITSM, Ansible Tower, and vRealize Automation.

Features Not Included in vSphere 7

There are no features deprecated in vSphere 7; however, there are some key changes to vCenter Server 7 Platform Services Controller (PSC) that improve SSO complexity.

  • vCenter Server 7 no longer allows deployment of the external PSC
  • vCenters with external PSCs will be converged to a vCenter with an embedded PSC during an upgrade and/or migration
  • The need for load balancers for vCenter appliance deployments and upgrades are no longer required and are now included in the PSC
  • The Converge Tool is removed from vSphere Client UI as convergence is executed during an upgrade and/or migration

vSphere 7 Pricing and Packaging for cloud providers

Current VMware Cloud Providers with active SnS contracts are eligible to upgrade their vSphere versions to vSphere 7 at no additional cost. The only edition available today for cloud provider partners is vSphere Enterprise Plus.

vSphere 7 licenses are enabled through the VMware Commerce Portal and eligible cloud provider partners will be able to report against vSphere 7 SKUs. At this time, vSphere with Kubernetes is currently tracking towards a mid-April release and will be generally available for VMware Cloud Providers to consume through VMware Cloud Foundation 4.

How to learn more

Register for these upcoming vmLIVEs covering what’s new with vSphere 7:

You can refer to the general vSphere 7 GA blog and datasheet for a full list of features and key capabilities.

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