Virtually Speaking Podcast

In this episode of the Virtually Speaking Podcast, Pete Flecha and John Nicholson continue the Advanced Services series with a deep dive into Network Observability. Joined by Broadcom’s Alec Pinkham, the conversation explores how traditional, reactive network monitoring falls short in modern hybrid and cloud-connected environments. The team discusses how network observability combines passive monitoring with active, synthetic traffic testing to provide true end-to-end visibility—from the end-user device to applications running across data centers, clouds, and third-party services. They also cover how this approach helps IT teams reduce mean-time-to-innocence, proactively detect issues, and validate large migrations. If you’re modernizing infrastructure or moving to VMware Cloud Foundation, this episode explains why understanding real user network experience is more critical than ever.  

  In this episode of the Virtually Speaking Advanced Services Series, we take a closer look at Automic Automation and how it helps organizations automate the business processes that run across their private cloud environments. John Nicholson and I are joined by Dave Kellermanns from Broadcom’s Agile Operations division to talk about where Automic fits, the kinds of workflows customers are automating today, and why the biggest automation wins often come from small, repetitive tasks. Rather than focusing only on infrastructure tasks, Automic is designed to orchestrate end-to-end business processes across multiple systems—everything from ERP and databases to legacy platforms and modern cloud services. We also cover real-world examples, including payroll automation, SAP data refreshes, and private AI data pipelines, along with practical advice on where to start with automation for the best ROI.

In this episode of the Virtually Speaking Podcast Advanced Services Series, we dive into VMware Data Services Manager (DSM) and how it delivers true Database-as-a-Service (DBaaS) capabilities for the private cloud. Pete Flecha and co-host Jad El-Zein are joined by Michael Gandy, Product Manager for DSM, to explore how organizations can simplify the deployment and lifecycle management of modern open-source databases like PostgreSQL and MySQL. With databases representing up to 30% of enterprise workloads, many IT teams are struggling to keep up with demand—especially as skilled database administrators become harder to find. That’s where DSM comes in. Built as an integrated service within VMware Cloud Foundation, DSM automates database provisioning, patching, backups, and lifecycle operations, while giving developers self-service access within IT-defined guardrails. The conversation also highlights a real-world example from Broadcom IT, where DSM was selected through a competitive evaluation and is now deliveri

In this episode of Virtually Speaking, hosts Pete Flecha and John Nicholson continue their Advanced Services series with a deep dive into VMware Advanced Cyber Compliance (ACC)—now generally available for VMware Cloud Foundation customers. Joined by Belu De Arbelaiz and Adam Hawley from VMware’s product management team, the conversation explores why cyber compliance and resilience have become mission-critical, and how ACC helps organizations move beyond manual, point-in-time audits to continuous enforcement and recovery. The discussion covers how ACC uses VMware Salt technology to define desired state configurations, detect drift, and automatically remediate issues at scale—monitoring tens of thousands of endpoints from a single control plane. The team also explains how ACC brings together compliance management and cyber disaster recovery, helping organizations meet evolving regulatory requirements such as DORA, GDPR, PCI DSS, and HIPAA while proving real-world recoverability. You’ll also learn how ACC align

VMware Cloud Foundation Advanced Services are often misunderstood — or overlooked entirely. In this episode of Virtually Speaking, we kick off a new series focused on how VCF Advanced Services extend the platform beyond core infrastructure to address real-world challenges in cyber resilience, security, application delivery, data services, and operations. Rick Walsworth joins the show to provide a high-level overview of how VCF Advanced Services help customers address real-world challenges such as cyber resilience, zero trust security, application delivery, database automation, network visibility, and business operations. In this episode, we cover how VCF Advanced Services help customers:  • Strengthen cyber resilience with Advanced Cyber Compliance (ACC)  • Implement zero trust security with vDefend  • Modernize application delivery with Avi Load Balancer  • Simplify database operations with Data Services Manager (DSM)  • Gain end-to-end visibility with Network Observability  • Optimize cost and operations w

In this episode of the Virtually Speaking Podcast, hosts Pete Flecha and John Nicholson welcome Vincent Riccio, VMware automation expert, for a deep dive into SaltStack automation and its role inside VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) Advanced Services. Vincent explains how SaltStack, delivered through VMware’s Advanced Cyber Compliance (ACC) service, brings powerful configuration management, state enforcement, and automated remediation to modern private cloud environments. We explore how SaltStack continuously maintains desired system states, detects drift, and automatically corrects issues in seconds — all at scale. You’ll learn: • How SaltStack’s master–minion architecture enables secure inbound-only communication • The difference between configuration management and state management • How the reactor + beacon system enables real-time automated drift remediation • Built-in compliance and vulnerability scanning using CIS benchmarks • Resource requirements for SaltStack appliances in lab and production environme

This episode of the Virtually Speaking Podcast features hosts Pete Flecha and John Nicholson joined by returning guest Pete Koehler for a deep dive into vSAN and the evolving conversation around application versus infrastructure high availability. Pete Koehler highlights recent updates to vSAN Ready Nodes that significantly reduce hardware requirements, including up to 67% less RAM and 50% fewer CPU cores for vSAN storage cluster hosts—bringing notable cost and efficiency benefits. From there, the discussion shifts to availability design strategies. The trio explores the differences between application-level availability (features built directly into the app, such as database clustering or microservices patterns) and infrastructure-level availability provided by the virtualization platform. They cover when each approach makes sense, how they complement each other, and why a balanced strategy delivers the best resilience. Whether you’re a VI admin, an architect, or an application owner, this episode breaks do

The Virtually Speaking Podcast heads to VMware Explore 2025, where Pete Flecha and John Nicholson sit down with Dale Hassinger, winner of this year’s VMware Explore Hackathon.   Dale shares the story behind his team’s winning project: a Model Contextual Protocol (MCP) server built in PowerShell that connects to VMware products and leverages AI tools like ChatGPT and Claude to automatically generate dashboards and reports. With AI doing most of the coding, their solution can transform VMware environment data into markdown tables, CSV files, or full graphical dashboards—without additional manual coding.   The team built the project in just two weeks and completed it during the intense four-hour hackathon event. Dale also gives credit to his teammates Don, Amos, Cosmin, and Willie, highlighting how the VMware community comes together through collaboration and innovation.   If you’re curious about how AI is reshaping development and what happens when creativity meets community at VMware Explore, this episode is

At VMware Explore 2025, hosts Pete Flecha and Dave Linthicum sat down with Paul Lembo, CTO for Strategic Americas at Broadcom, to capture the energy and insights from the event. Paul reflects on conversations with customers, partners, and integrators, highlighting how VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) is building trust by delivering on promises made the previous year.   One of the biggest crowd-pleasers was the free certification opportunities, where attendees who passed walked away with custom VCF sneakers. Paul shares why this matters for practitioners and how executive sponsorship plays a critical role in successful transformation. He also emphasizes the importance of VMware’s full-stack solutions in helping practitioners succeed, while Dave highlights VMware’s strategy of adding value without forcing customers to rip and replace existing systems.   This conversation showcases VMware by Broadcom’s continued focus on meeting customers where they are, building momentum in private cloud adoption, and enabling or

At VMware Explore 2025, Pete Flecha and John Nicholson sit down with Chandra Prathuri, Product Management, VMware Cloud Foundation Division at Broadcom, to dive into the automation capabilities of VMware Cloud Foundation 9.0   The conversation kicks off with an analogy of turtles and tunnels, pointing out how slow and fragmented traditional IT operations can feel. Chandra explains how VCF 9 is designed to eliminate those bottlenecks by giving admins AWS-like self-service experiences on-premises—without the risk of surprise bills.   Key topics include: Automation at scale: Streamlining workflows that typically span compute, storage, network, and security teams. Fleet management: Lifecycle management with minimal downtime, certificate management, and desired state configuration. Governance and cost control: Balancing agility with oversight and financial predictability. Kubernetes and AI readiness: Native Kubernetes support plus GPU time-slicing to optimize workloads (e.g., inference during the day, tra

At VMware Explore 2025 (Day Three), hosts Pete Flecha and John Nicholson sit down with Raj Bhatt from AMD and Dave Morera from Broadcom to discuss a major announcement: VMware’s support for AMD Instinct MI350 GPUs for Private AI workloads.   Raj dives into the specs of the MI350—288GB of memory and nearly 20 petaflops of performance, packaged in a UBB form factor with eight GPUs connected together—making it ideal for running large AI models. Dave explains how this partnership expands customer hardware choices while delivering the same seamless Private AI software experience powered by VMware Cloud Foundation.   The conversation also highlights: How AMD’s ROCM (Radeon Open Compute Model) framework enables flexibility with AI models. VMware Cloud Foundation’s automation for deploying these GPUs. AMD’s open-source and free software approach, reducing subscription costs. Hardware availability through OEM partners like Supermicro and Dell, with both air-cooled and water-cooled options. Compatibility wit

The Virtually Speaking Podcast is back from VMware Explore 2025 with an inspiring conversation featuring Nick Kuhn.   Hosts Pete Flecha and John Nicholson dive into Nick’s incredible home lab journey—from starting with a single HPZ 440 workstation to building a massive 16-host environment capable of running large language models.   Nick shares how his passion for vSAN sparked the growth of his lab, how winning first place at the 2023 Explore Hackathon with an AI project fueled his expansion, and why he focused on NVIDIA RTX 3090s for the best price-performance. Today, his setup includes multiple quad-GPU systems and supports colleagues through Tanzu Platform, enabling shared workloads and demos.   The discussion explores: How Nick evolved his lab from hobby to professional resource Lessons learned with vSAN and GPU collections for AI workloads Running local LLMs vs. relying on costly cloud subscriptions The role of Tanzu in delivering a multi-tenant private AI environment   Whether you’re into home

On day three of VMware Explore 2025, Pete Flecha and John Nicholson sit down with Drew Nielsen to explore the economic value of VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF).   Drew explains how customer sentiment has shifted since last year—organizations have moved past the “five stages of grief” around perpetual licensing and are now fully embracing VCF. He highlights how VCF 9 with memory tiering delivers measurable savings: ~40% less costly than public cloud ~50% less costly than building a traditional three-tier data center   The discussion dives into hardware refresh strategies, emphasizing NVMe drives as essential for memory tiering, and introduces the Private Cloud Maturity and Optimization Tool (PCMO). The PCMO now goes beyond cost modeling with new upgrade readiness features, helping customers identify blockers and prepare for VCF 9 adoption.   Whether you’re evaluating cloud costs, planning your next hardware refresh, or considering a VCF upgrade, this conversation offers practical insights on how to maximi

In this episode of the Virtually Speaking Podcast, hosts Pete Flecha and John Nicholson sit down with Nick Kuhn from VMware Tanzu during VMware Explore 2025. Nick—who also hosts Cloud Foundry Weekly—breaks down what Tanzu is today following VMware’s recent organizational changes under Broadcom.   He explains how Kubernetes components (now called VMware Kubernetes Service, or VKS) have shifted to the VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) division, while Tanzu now focuses on Platform as a Service (PaaS) technologies originating from Pivotal Software. Nick highlights how Tanzu Platform complements VCF by giving developers a simplified experience: just push code and let the platform handle infrastructure complexity.   The conversation also covers: How Tanzu integrates with VCF components like NSX and Avi Load Balancer New announcements including Tanzu Platform 10.3 and VMware Tanzu Data Intelligence (a Snowflake/Databricks-like solution for VCF environments) Nick’s personal Koon Labs setup, which showcases Tanzu i

In this episode of the Virtually Speaking Podcast, hosts Pete Flecha and John Nicholson sit down with Jad El-Zein, technologist at Broadcom, live from VMware Explore 2025.   Jad, who recently returned to the VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) team after his time with the Tanzu Business Unit, shares his perspective on application modernization and how VCF 9.0 delivers a complete private cloud platform for today’s workloads. He explains why “modern apps” shouldn’t be limited to just Kubernetes or containers, but should include any application that drives business value—including VMs.   The conversation covers: VMware’s journey in the Kubernetes space since 2015, strengthened by the Heptio acquisition in 2018 The rise of hybrid runtimes, where VMs and containers coexist seamlessly How Tanzu Mission Control integrates into VCF automation for multi-cluster management The role of infrastructure services in delivering application resilience Advice for IT leaders on approaching app modernization, including trea

In this episode of the Virtually Speaking Podcast from VMware Explore 2025, Pete Flecha and John Nicholson sit down with vSAN expert Pete Koehler to dig into the latest advancements in vSAN technology.   The conversation explores how vSAN design and operations have evolved, with networking now taking center stage over disk configurations as the platform moves fully to all-NVMe and ESA architecture. Pete Koehler shares insights on how VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) operations integrate with vSAN, highlighting the benefits of Broadcom’s unified product strategy under Hock Tan’s directive.   Key topics include: The surge in vSAN ESA adoption and how it’s meeting expectations Global deduplication at the cluster level for greater storage efficiency A tech preview of native S3 object storage built directly into vSAN   Whether you’re a VI admin, architect, or just curious about where VMware’s storage strategy is heading, this episode delivers valuable perspectives straight from the expert.  

In this episode of the Virtually Speaking Podcast, hosts Pete Flecha and John Nicholson talk with Drew Nielsen from Broadcom about the major changes to VMware’s certification program following the Broadcom acquisition.   Drew breaks down how VMware has streamlined certifications from five tracks into three clear, role-specific paths for:

In this VMware Explore 2025 edition of the Virtually Speaking Podcast, hosts Pete Flecha and John Nicholson talk with Raj Reddi from the United States Senate Federal Credit Union (USSFCU) and Alexis Colon, Sr. Solutions Architect at Broadcom.   Raj shares how USSFCU—serving a sensitive membership that includes Senate and Supreme Court communities—successfully upgraded from VCF 5.2 to VCF 9 with minimal downtime, despite having a lean IT team of just 22 people.   Key highlights include:

In this episode of the Virtually Speaking Podcast, recorded at VMware Explore 2025, hosts Pete Flecha and John Nicholson sit down with Vijay Ramachandran, VP of Products for Core Infrastructure at Broadcom.   Vijay shares the latest innovations in VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) that are reshaping core infrastructure:

At VMware Explore 2025, hosts Pete Flecha and John Nicholson sit down with Himanshu Singh to unpack one of the biggest announcements: Private AI is now natively built into VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF 9.0).   With this shift, customers no longer need an add-on service—all Private AI capabilities are included as part of VCF entitlement, making AI more accessible and integrated than ever.   Key highlights from the conversation: