VMware Cloud on AWS

VMware Cloud on AWS allows to use the corporate software of VMware for creation of software-defined DPC in a cloud of AWS.

2018

Expansion of geography of service in Europe and the USA

On November 7, 2018 the VMware company announced the further VMware Cloud on AWS expansion in Europe and the USA. In the fourth quarter 2018 start in additional regions of AWS EU (Ireland), AWS West (Northern California), AWS East (Ohio) is expected.

The cloud service of VMware Cloud on AWS provides uniformity of infrastructure and integrity of operational processes both in software-defined DPC based on VMware Cloud Foundation, and in the AWS cloud environment. It allows customers to migrate easily loadings in a cloud, to scale infrastructure "on demand" and to start in hybrid application environment of the last generation, reliably protecting them from abnormal failures and providing the optimized access to AWS services. The identical architecture of local and cloud infrastructures and operational experience in both environments allows IT specialists to provide quickly value for business from use of a hybrid cloud of VMware and AWS. Purchase VMware Cloud on AWS and get support at implementation and operation it is possible at VMware and an ecosystem of partners.

Global presence of VMware Cloud on AWS continues to extend. Start of service happens in several regions at the same time. VMware Cloud on AWS becomes the priority environment for customers who transfer workloads of VMware to a public cloud. For the last 6 months more than 200 partners of VMware received competence of this solution — together we provide to our clients a strong hybrid cloud solution for support of the most exacting applications, providing the raised security level and giving required scaling options. Mark Lomayer, senior vice president and CEO, Cloud Platform Business Unit, VMware

Protection of business operations using service of fast scalable disaster recovery

Improvements in service of Disaster recovery as a Service (DRaaS) in VMware Cloud on AWS service provide reliable protection for large-scale and resource-intensive workloads. At the same time both the cost, and complexity of the solution for ensuring continuity of work of business and critical applications decreases.

Use of VMware Site Recovery allows customers to get advantage of the automated orchestration, ensuring fault tolerance and the automated recovery after failure, to reduce costs for the reserve platform, to accelerate providing infrastructure with protection against failures, to increase stability of business and to simplify transaction of recovery of IT of infrastructure after accident. With the provided release of service VMware announced that VMware Site Recovery will support up to 1000 virtual machines on software-defined DPC that will reduce the total cost and operating costs for protection of large-scale environments.

Customers pay only for those resources which really use, requesting them "on demand". At the expense of it operating costs are minimized. Elastic DRS allows clients to optimize resource management due to automation of scaling of a cluster of SDDC after working off of failure of infrastructure on the basis of user requirements. Elastic vSAN and Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS) will help to reduce significantly costs for protection of the workloads which are intensively using a system data storage.

The integrated solution Dell EMC VxRail and VMware Site Recovery allows to provide complex recovery of infrastructure with "clicking of one button" in a cloud of VMware Cloud on AWS. Thanks to it customers can configure and test quickly functions of disaster recovery with VxRail in a cloud "on demand". At the same time customers get advantages due to uniformity in processes of operation of hyper convergent infrastructure based on VMware of vSAN which is the cornerstone of both VxRail, and VMware Cloud on AWS.

Hybrid cloud for virtual desktops and applications

VMware Horizon 7 for VMware Cloud on AWS provides the integrated hybrid cloud for virtual desktops and applications. The combination of opportunities of VMware Cloud on AWS and VMware Horizon provides a simple, safe and scalable solution. Customers can accelerate deployment of desktops of Horizon 7 — one desktop can be started on average in 1-2 seconds, at the same time consumption of a disk space is reduced by 80% due to Instant Clone technology. After the user's exit from a system there is an automatic update of OS and application of patches — that simplifies service. VMware also announced integration of Horizon 7 with a cloud service of Horizon Cloud Service that it, in turn, will provide transparency, monitoring of working capacity and support for deployments of Horizon 7 both in a cloud of VMware on AWS, and in local infrastructure.

Support of large-scale migrations with ensuring bigger security and a possibility of transfer of applications worldwide

The permanent VMware Cloud on AWS expansion in regions of AWS and the added functionality of service allows customers to migrate quicker applications in a cloud and to expand the DPCs at the expense of resources from a cloud. Earlier "live" migration of a large number of loadings led to high overheads of synchronization of data. The functionality of VMware Cloud Motion and vSphere Replication in the solution VMware Hybrid Cloud Extension provide predictable "live" migration of thousands of virtual machines without idle time.

Besides, thanks to integration with VMware NSX, one of principal components of VMware Cloud on AWS, and AWS Direct Connect, clients receive the high-performance and safer virtual cloud network allowing to accelerate process of migration of workloads in a cloud.

The updated functionality of In-Product Support Experience in VMware Cloud on AWS

Customers unroll the business critical applications in a cloud of VMware Cloud on AWS. Therefore effective technical support has for them enormous value for ensuring operational efficiency and the continuity of business processes. The built-in functionality of In-Product Support Experience provides access to communication channels and resources, including a chat with support, management of requests for support, support of community and intellectual search directly from the environment of VMware of the customer. It provides the simplified support process, allowing customers quicker and more simply to solve the arising problems.

Availability in the Pacific Rim

On September 6, 2018 the VMworld company announced that the VMware Cloud on AWS service is available in the Pacific Rim. The next functions which will help the organizations to accelerate the translation of applications and DPCs in really safe cloud meeting requirements of the companies worldwide are also announced.

As it was reported, VMware Cloud on AWS is the service unrolled "on demand". With its help it is possible to reduce costs and to reduce labor input of migration in a cloud. Service provides the infrastructure and transactions corresponding used in corporate DPCs of customers and also tools, processes and procedures with the checked efficiency for service of applications with the highest requirements. Purchase VMware Cloud on AWS and get support at its implementation and operation it is possible at VMware and participants of the affiliate program of the company. The basis of the solution is formed by the corporate software of VMware for software-defined DPC unrolled in AWS Cloud infrastructure. Customers start the productive applications in the environment of a hybrid cloud based on VMware vSphere and at the same time get the optimized access to the broadest spectrum of AWS services and reliable protection against failures.

The VMware Cloud on AWS service is available in many regions worldwide, including the USA, Europe and Asia-Pacific countries now. Besides, we increased the frequency of an exit of the next innovation opportunities and powerful solutions for our customers. VMware Cloud on AWS is the solution for support of migration of applications, crucial for business, and even the whole DPCs in a cloud. Upon completion of such transfer customers will work with software-defined DPCs of VMware and also flexible infrastructure and various services AWS. Mark Lohmeyer, senior vice president and CEO of division of cloud platforms of VMware company

According to representatives of the company, the major characteristics and functions of the updated VMware Cloud on AWS service are:

• The minimum configuration for a half of former cost;
• Optimization of licenses for corporate applications OracleMicrosoft (/);
• Evacuation of DPC due to migration of thousands of virtual machines in real time;
• Possibility of use of storage of high capacity based on Amazon Elastic Block Store (Amazon of EBS);
• The program focused security with VMware NSX;
• Integration of NSX/AWS Direct Connect for simpler high-performance connections;
• Optimization of costs/performance due to automatic scaling;
• The free tool for management of magazines in real time.

Updating and availability in Europe

The VMware company announced on March 14, 2018 the next updating of VMware Cloud on AWS and its availability to the European customers. Thanks to the implemented functions cloud migration and deployment of a hybrid cloud using VMware Cloud on AWS can be performed quicker and more simply now, developers claim.

In general the solution is presented to users ekspluatatsionno by a uniform method to start, manage and ensure safety of applications in a hybrid cloud environment. The uniformity of infrastructure of segments of a hybrid cloud will give to customers more freedom on movement of applications between local DPCs based on VMware vSphere and a cloud of AWS and also will accelerate migration in a public cloud.

VMware Cloud on AWS also offers access to a broad spectrum of the innovation services AWS — to cloud computing, databases, analytical tools, Internet of Things (IoT), security aids, mobile services, services of applications, etc. Customers of VMware Cloud on AWS will be able to use the same services checked in DPC and solutions on management of a cloud, expanding on a public segment of a hybrid cloud tools, politicians and experiment on management of critical applications and also ensuring their security.

According to developers, VMware Cloud on AWS simplifies transition to cloud infrastructure. With this solution customers will be able to move the existing and new workloads to a cloud and at the same time to achieve optimal functionality, adaptivity, security and performance as locally, and in a cloud.

Within updating of VMware provided following features:

• Protection of crucial applications
  • Possibilities of VMware Cloud on AWS will protect applications from errors of different type — the DPCs caused by failures in work and zones of availability and also failures at the level of a host and the virtual machine. VMware Cloud on AWS offers zero target recovery point (RPO) which will allow to achieve high fault tolerance of applications in all zones of availability AWS (AWS AZ) with the stretched clusters of VMware.

• The optimized work with applications with processing of large volumes of data
  • In process of acceleration of growth of amounts of data in an application cloud, the processing Big Data, will receive additional benefits from use of native compression and deduplication of the solution of VMware of vSAN. It will allow to reduce total cost of ownership (TCO) and at the same time to use opportunities highly productive a flash arrays. By calculations of specialists, applying deduplication and compression of vSAN, customers will be able to reduce storage costs concerning standard loadings half. Implementation of model of elastic calculations "on demand" will also allow to get rid of not used resources.

• VMware vMotion for migration of workloads
  • In updating the VMware vMotion function is available to migration of virtual machines between a local segment of infrastructure and VMware Cloud on AWS without their stop and also between hosts in clusters of VMware Cloud on AWS. VMware will also add a feature for vMotion between hosts in the stretched cluster consisting of two zones of availability of AWS.

• Access to desktops from any place at any time
  • Thanks to VMware Horizon support customers will be able easily to implement and start virtual desktops and applications of Horizon in VMware Cloud on AWS using "cloud" consumer economy. VMware Horizon will allow to use services of local desktops in a cloud needlessly in acquisition of the additional hardware and also to place virtual desktops or the published annexes in a cloud near the application servers sensitive to delays.

• The simplified migration in a cloud and operation of cloud infrastructure
  • Technologies of VMware allow to set and configure quicker and easier the SDDC environments based on VMware Cloud on AWS and also to manage them. Thanks to integration into the solutions AWS CloudFormation and Hashicorp Terraform customers automate providing resources at the level of SDDC using popular and usual tools for DevOps.

• The center of developers integrated into the service VMware Cloud on AWS console
  • Automation experts, engineers of DevOps and developers will get access to detailed information through this centralized portal about API SDK, to code samples and command line interfaces. Besides, customers will be able to accelerate an initial configuration of network and to optimize the current operation, having applied opportunities for work with network and VMware NSX security aids, including Firewall the Tunnel Status Monitor, Connectivity Checker and Rule Accelerator functions.

VMware also expanded a portfolio of own cloud services to help customers to manage multicloud environments and at the same time to provide uniformity of IT operation in DPC and a cloud.

The updated portfolio includes the following offers:

• VMware Hybrid Cloud Extension service for expansion of a private cloud due to connection of a public cloud
  • Support of mobility of applications and hybridism of infrastructure is provided for local and cloud deployments of vSphere of different versions according to the SaaS model. Earlier announced Hybrid Cloud Extension services for IBM Cloud and VMware Cloud on AWS are already available to customers. Now VMware added the service providing support and own corporate DPCs to this packet. Hybrid Cloud Extension provides operational support for large-scale movements of workloads in the environments covering several private DPCs. Hybrid Cloud Extension also gives to the companies the chance of safe migration of applications in the heterogeneous VMware vSphere environments without their modification and idle times (or with insignificant idle times). Thanks to an opportunity to use Hybrid Cloud Extension service in combination with IBM Cloud and VMware Cloud on AWS customers will be able to connect the environments based on technologies of VMware to a public cloud for increase in power on demand and their geographical expansion.

• The optimized VMware Wavefront service
  • The large-scale platform for monitoring and analytics based on SaaS supports native cloud and corporate applicaions, infrastructures of a public and private cloud (including AWS and Google Cloud Platform) and also the workloads let in Azure and, since recent time, in VMware Cloud on AWS. VMware added to Wavefront for 45 abilities to integrate with other solutions, including with GCP, Chef, GitHub, Spark, Nginx + and Mesos. They supplement already available means of connection to AWS Lambda, Kafka and Docker. Integration expands a set of information which can be integrated, visualized and traced using Wavefront. Service supports now Kubernetes within container service Pivotal Container Service (PKS), services of application development platforms (for example, Pivotal Cloud Foundry/PCF) and the corporate applications started in private clouds based on VMware. Wavefront was also integrated with VMware vRealize Operations.

• Service of the analysis of the registers VMware Log Intelligence
  • The offer in a packet of cloud services of Log Intelligence — the tool for receiving detailed analytical outputs about work of DPC based on VMware and VMware Cloud on AWS. The functionality of Log Intelligence allows to detect and fix quickly problems and also to manage on a centralized basis event logs from several clouds, including VMware Cloud on AWS. In Log Intelligence possibilities of machine learning and analytics of event logs in real time are implemented. Search of deviations in work of DPC and cloud environments happens continuously now. Service offers a search capability according to event logs and also complex dashboards which give a picture of behavior of applications, uniform in terms of IT, and a status of a core infrastructure.

• Broader service of expense analysis of VMware Cost Insight
  • In addition to the available support of AWS, Microsoft Azure and private cloud DPCs of VMware, the updated Cost Insight is able to analyze in detail the workloads moved to VMware Cloud on AWS including to calculate an opportunity and the cost of applications launch in a private or public cloud. Thanks to integration with VMware Network Insight the Cost Insight service makes a detailed and objective picture of expenses on migration, and employees of IT will gain more faithful representation about an opportunity to estimate the total cost of the application, including approximate expenses on an exit of network and IOPS (number of transactions of input-output) of storage after migration. Other Cost Insight functions are recommendations about savings, warnings, drawing up reports. Users of service can also set threshold values of expenses always to remain within the budget.

2017: Start

On August 30, 2017 the VMware company announced availability of VMware Cloud on AWS.

Using VMware Cloud on AWS customers will be able to start applications in any private, public and hybrid cloud under control of VMware vSphere and to get the optimized access to AWS services. IT specialists will be able to manage the cloud resources, using familiar tools of VMware.

VMware Cloud on AWS is supported by the VMware Cloud Foundation platform. The solution is proposed by a full range of software-defined services (calculations, storage, network configurations and security) in the form of the uniform integrated stack which is started on scalable infrastructure of AWS.

"VMware and AWS help teams on IT and to operation to make value added for business. The combination of opportunities of VMware for corporations and characteristics and scale of AWS Cloud allows to create the platform for any application — Pat Gelsinger, the chief executive of VMware company comments. — With VMware Cloud on AWS customers receive completely integrated hybrid cloud which has the same architecture, opportunities and features of operation, as their local environment based on vSphere and the AWS environment".

VMware Cloud on AWS is provided and VMware as a scalable cloud service on demand is supported. It facilitates migration of applications in a cloud and cloud portability, optimizes work of IT and expands opportunities for use of a hybrid cloud environment for customers.

The solution VMware Cloud on AWS it is possible to purchase the West of the USA (Oregon) in AWS region.

2016: Announcement

On October 13, 2016 the companies VMware also Amazon Web Services (AWS) announced the joint service VMware Cloud on AWS designed to pull together traditional IT infrastructures pages cloud computing. The solution allows to start software-defined data centers VMware in a public cloud of AWS.

VMware Cloud on AWS is constructed on the platform of software-defined data center VMware Cloud Foundation which includes the system of virtualization of the VMware vSphere servers, software-defined storage VMware Virtual SAN and the solution of network virtualization of NSX.

Глава Amazon Web Services of Andy Jesse (at the left) and the CEO of VMware Pat Gelsinger on the presentations of VMware Cloud on AWS, October, 2016

The new scalable solution will allow to start applications in  private, public and  hybrid cloud environments  based on VMware vSphere. Customers can use earlier purchased software products of VMware for work with the AWS services providing information storage, access to databases, the analyst, etc.

The head of AWS Andy Jassy noted that VMware Cloud on AWS will save corporate clients from the difficult choice about where to place applications — on the local equipment, in a public or private cloud.

According to him though AWS only provides computing infrastructure for VMware Cloud on AWS, this project opens huge opportunities before the company. In the future the size of the market of cloud infrastructure will reach billions and even trillions of dollars, and the small group will be leaders here, Jesse is sure.

Commercial start of VMware Cloud on AWS is planned for the middle of 2017. The cost of the solution is going to be published closer to global release of a product.

The analyst of IDC Al Gillen considers that cooperation of AWS and VMware will quicker bring benefit of the last as she receives "a world-class competitive public cloud" from the transaction. In the long term VMware Cloud on AWS will bear fruits and Amazon because the company will be able to provide to clients "a simple exit to AWS", the expert believes.^[1]

Notes