Originally reported by Container Journal, April 2020.
VMware Broadens Tanzu Availability for Kubernetes Teams
VMware has advanced its Kubernetes strategy by moving several components of its Tanzu portfolio from preview into general availability, while pushing others into beta. The releases span tools for building, deploying, and managing applications across Kubernetes environments—both on-premises and in public clouds.
What Became Generally Available
Three products reached general availability in this wave of releases:
- Tanzu Kubernetes Grid (TKG): A service for provisioning and managing any distribution of Kubernetes across on-premises data centers and public clouds. TKG gives operators a consistent way to deploy upstream Kubernetes regardless of the underlying infrastructure.
- Tanzu Kubernetes Grid Integrated Edition (TKGI) 1.7: Formerly known as VMware Enterprise PKS, this edition targets enterprise teams that need production-grade Kubernetes with integrated networking (NSX-T), storage, and lifecycle management.
- Tanzu Application Service (TAS) 2.9: A managed runtime environment for Java, .NET, and Node.js applications, TAS is VMware’s evolution of Pivotal Cloud Foundry. It provides a platform-as-a-service layer on top of Kubernetes for teams that want developer-friendly abstractions rather than raw Kubernetes primitives.
Alongside these, VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) 4.0 also reached general availability. VCF 4.0 provides the integrated virtual infrastructure stack—compute, storage, and networking—required to run vSphere 7 with Kubernetes embedded, enabling the Supervisor Cluster that underpins the Tanzu portfolio on-premises.
What Entered Beta
Two additional components moved into public beta at the same time:
- Tanzu Application Service for Kubernetes (TAS for K8s): A Kubernetes-native repackaging of the Cloud Foundry application runtime, allowing teams to run TAS workloads directly on standard Kubernetes clusters rather than BOSH-managed VMs.
- Tanzu Build Service: Based on the open-source Cloud Native Buildpacks specification, Tanzu Build Service automates the creation of OCI-compliant container images from application source code, removing the need for teams to hand-craft Dockerfiles.
The Tanzu Strategy: A Unified Path to Cloud-Native
Craig McLuckie, then Vice President of Research and Development at VMware, described the Tanzu portfolio as a “superhighway” designed to meet IT organizations wherever they are in their Kubernetes adoption journey. The portfolio spans three broad categories:
- Build: Tools like Tanzu Build Service for packaging application code into container images.
- Run: Runtimes like TAS and TKG for deploying and operating applications on Kubernetes clusters.
- Manage: Management plane services for overseeing clusters running on VMware VMs, public cloud VMs, or bare-metal infrastructure.
A key design principle is vendor neutrality at the infrastructure layer. Tanzu is intended to manage Kubernetes clusters regardless of whether they run on vSphere, AWS, Azure, GCP, or bare metal—addressing the common enterprise concern about cloud lock-in.
Management Plane Consolidation as a Priority
One theme McLuckie emphasized was the unsustainable cost of operating separate management frameworks for each cloud and on-premises environment. Tanzu’s management layer aims to consolidate cluster observability, policy enforcement, and lifecycle operations into a single control plane—reducing operational overhead and the total cost of IT.
This has particular relevance for multi-cloud enterprises, which have historically accumulated a patchwork of cloud-specific dashboards, CLI tools, and automation pipelines. A unified management plane allows platform engineering teams to apply consistent governance—RBAC, network policy, image scanning—across every cluster in the fleet.
Context: Cloud-Native Adoption in Early 2020
These releases came during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, a period that accelerated cloud adoption in some sectors (online services, education, healthcare) while causing others to pause or retrench. The broader point remains relevant today: organizations at different stages of cloud-native maturity need different tools. Some teams are ready to write microservices from scratch on raw Kubernetes; others need a higher-level runtime like TAS that abstracts away cluster management entirely.
The Tanzu portfolio’s layered structure—from infrastructure automation at the VCF level up to developer-facing runtimes at the TAS level—is a deliberate attempt to serve both audiences without forcing a single migration path.
Key Takeaways for Platform and DevOps Engineers
- If your organization runs vSphere and wants to add Kubernetes without abandoning existing infrastructure investments, VCF 4.0 + TKG is the entry point.
- If your development teams already use Cloud Foundry workflows (cf push), TAS 2.9 or the beta TAS for Kubernetes provides a migration bridge to Kubernetes without requiring teams to learn kubectl immediately.
- If you need enterprise Kubernetes with integrated NSX-T networking and a supported lifecycle, TKGI 1.7 targets that use case.
- If you want to standardize container image builds across teams and eliminate Dockerfile sprawl, Tanzu Build Service (now GA in later releases) is worth evaluating.
For the latest product versions and feature updates, refer to the official VMware Tanzu documentation.