VMware, Dell add heft to on-prem cloud service

Aiming to help customers handle growing on-premises workloads, VMware and Dell EMC have bolstered their co-developed cloud software.

First introduced in 2018, VMware Cloud on Dell EMC is intended to help enterpise customers move on-premises infrastructure and workloads to the cloud. Version 2.0 of VMware Cloud on Dell EMC bri-gs improved support for high-density and high-performance data-center applications. 

VMware Cloud on Dell EMC consists of VMware’s high-performance compute, storage and networking software, powered by VMware vSphere, vSAN and NSX, tightly integrated with Dell EMC VxRail hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) hardware, and delivered as a service all –  managed by VMware.

“Organizations can migrate existing VMware-based workloads immediately to this cloud service, eliminating any re-development, re-factoring, or architectural rework and related costs,” said Fidelma Russo, senior vice president and general manager, VMware Cloud on Dell EMC in a statement.

The 2.0 release broadens the number of Dell EMC VxRail instances available on VMware Cloud on Dell EMC.

The companies have added a larger, full height 48 core Intel SP processor rack that includes redundant Dell EMC network switches, smart power distribution units, 768 GB RAM and 23 TB of NVMe all-flash storage. Version 1.0 came in half-height rack and supported half the number of cores.  

The new package is capable of handling workloads with heavier CPU, memory, and storage demands such as databases, AI/ML applications, and virtual desktops, said Wei Wang, director of product marketing for VMware Cloud on Dell EMC. 

In a blog about the announcement VMware vice president and CTO Kit Colbert stated that 2.0 will also include a “technical preview” that will help customers migrate bulk workloads to the VMware Cloud on Dell EMC service.

The feature will use the VMware HCX application-mobility platform to let customers migrate hundreds of live workloads at once with no downtime in order to reduce deployment time and operational complexity, Colbert stated. “This is a highly utilized feature on VMware Cloud on AWS and within data centers when corporations have a strong need to move large numbers of workloads from one environment to another,” Colbert stated.

Version 2.0 can let customers manage VMware Cloud on Dell EMC and VMware Cloud on AWS from one on-prem location.

Colbert noted that VMware supports a variety  of on-prem options to support customers’ hybrid-cloud deployments – VMware Cloud on AWS, VMware Cloud on Dell EMC, and in the near future, VMware Cloud on AWS Outposts. “A common hybrid-cloud control plane fuels all three products underneath and provides a single pane of glass for visibility and control,” he stated.

Other new features in 2.0 include certified support for VMware’s virtual desktop infrastructure, Horizon. 

VMware Horizon lets enterprise customers offer remote workers secure access to desktops and applications – especially valuable in highly regulated industries such as healthcare and financial services, Colbert stated. VMware Cloud on Dell is now fully certified for VMware Horizon to deliver virtual desktops on-premises, at the edge or in the data center, Colbert stated.

Additionally, a big part of VMware Cloud on Dell EMC’s cloud experience is being able to order new racks online, Colbert stated.

“Customers make the order and a few weeks later, one or more racks show up where they want. However, after the racks were ordered, there wasn’t an easy way to add additional nodes,” Colbert stated. “With this release, we’ve now added support to expand node capacity from the self-service order interface.  Customers can now start small and easily expand capacity as their application needs demand.”

VMware Cloud on Dell EMC available now.