VMware as part of an effort to extend its dominance of on-premises IT environments into the rapidly evolving realm of cloud-native applications today formally made available a competency certification of Pivotal Container Service (PKS), a distribution of open source Kubernetes container orchestration software that VMware developed in collaboration with sister company Pivotal Software.
The VMware PKS competency is designed to reward partners that help VMware customers integrate an instance of Kubernetes that comes bundled with an instance of VMware NSX network virtualization software. PKS is at the core of VMware strategy to operationalize Kubernetes in enterprise IT environments that starts in public clouds where Kubernetes is most widely deployed. VMware, however, has also made it apparent that it plans to drive PKS adoption into on-premises environments where it currently enjoys more dominance.
Right now, there is a chronic shortage of Kubernetes expertise. VMware is turning to the channel to fill that gap, says Teri Bruns, vice president of global partner solutions for VMware. At the core of that opportunity is the ability to extend the expertise partners have developed around platforms such as NSX, VMware vSan, and VMware vSphere into a Kubernetes platform that is currently being deployed most commonly on top of virtual machines, says Brun.
The subtle difference is the PKS; once it is installed, it is essentially a form of a managed service delivered by VMware. All the updates to the core PKS platform will be managed by VMware. Channel partners will be able to generate revenue by primarily focusing their efforts on the core deployment and integration opportunity, says Bruns.
“This is a service niche opportunity for partners,” says Bruns.
The challenge VMware face is convincing customers to deploy its distribution of Kubernetes over the roughly 70 other distributions of Kubernetes that have been certified by the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF), which oversees the development of Kubernetes. IT operations teams that have invested in VMware are not always able to exercise control over what instances of Kubernetes gets deployed, especially in organizations where developers now hold more sway over platform decisions.
The one thing that is apparent is that VMware needs channel partners that have container expertise to make a case for PKS. There’s considerable debate long term as to whether Kubernetes clusters will be primarily deployed on top of virtual machines or employed as alternatives to virtual machines that can be deployed directly on top of bare-metal servers. Whatever the outcome, however, VMware would like to make sure that as many instances of Kubernetes as possible that get deployed on top of VMware are based on a distribution curated by VMware.
Be First to Comment