VMware has introduced Project Northstar, which it says will accelerate enterprise application and cloud journeys by simplifying how networking and security services are consumed in a multi-cloud world. Project Northstar was first announced in technology preview at VMware Explore US.
The project delivers multi-cloud networking, security, workload mobility, and end-to-end threat detection and response, from a centralised management console that the company helps customers achieve consistent policy, automation, and simplified SaaS consumption across private and public clouds.
At VMware Expolre Europe in Barcelona yesterday, VMware also announced enhancements to its NSX ALB PULSE Cloud Service to help organisations with their cloud operating models via centralised management, orchestration, and observability across the full cloud networking infrastructure.
“As enterprises move to a multi-cloud world, they must re-evaluate how they connect, secure, and manage applications and workloads distributed across private and public cloud environments,” says Umesh Mahajan, senior VP and GM for VMware’s Networking and Security business unit.
"Traditional network architecture and tools have not kept pace with the enterprise’s cloud transformation, leading to complexity and operational challenges in managing multi-cloud infrastructure,”
He describes Project Northstar as a major advancement of VMware NSX that hopes to empower customers with a set of integrated on-demand multi-cloud networking and security services.
The project includes centralised policy management, which will allow customers to manage networking and security policies centrally across all their cloud environments, with integrated networking and security operations and troubleshooting.
Also, the NSX Intelligence service will provide a comprehensive real-time view across a customer's multi-cloud environment. It's powered by a scalable data lake managed by VMware that ingests data on traffic flow and will provide recommendations for network and security policies across multi-cloud deployments. Moreover, its network traffic analysis will provide further insights into threats and detect behavioural anomalies.
The network detection and response (NDR) service will provide scalable threat detection and response for workloads deployed across multi-clouds, and the NDR correlation engine will analyse IDPS, malware, and anomaly events based on threat campaigns, to help customers prevent alert overload and simplify SOC monitoring processes.
Mahajan says by enabling consistent policy, operations, and automation across multiple cloud environments, Project Northstar represents the future of cloud-smart networking and security services delivered via a flexible subscription model.
According to him, Project Northstar represents a 'strategic shift' to deliver these services across on-premise, hybrid, and multi-cloud environments via a SaaS delivery model.
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