Broadcom Contributes VM API Open Source Project to Cloud Native Computing Foundation

CNCF stewardship opens community participation in developing a virtual-machine operating model across infrastructure providers.

Rhea-AI Summary

Broadcom (AVGO) announced that its VM API open-source project has been accepted into the Cloud Native Computing Foundation Sandbox. The project enables virtual machines to be provisioned and managed through Kubernetes APIs across multiple infrastructure providers. Broadcom describes CNCF stewardship as an opportunity to develop a community-driven API and operating model for virtual machines.

Broadcom is also co-chairing the newly formed Workload Conformance Working Group, which aims to establish a shared standard for how workloads run on Kubernetes. Separately, more than 20 new partner solutions have been validated for VMware vSphere Kubernetes Service.

Positive

• Minor pointVM API acceptance into the CNCF Sandbox marks a completed open-source project milestone.

Negative

• None.

Key Figures

Validated partner solutions: More than 20 Production applications using VMs: 53% Survey participants: 492 practitioners +1 more

Validated partner solutions

More than 20

New solutions validated for VMware vSphere Kubernetes Service

Production applications using VMs

53%

2026 Virtual Machines Report

Survey participants

492 practitioners

2026 Virtual Machines Report

AI and agentic workloads cited in VM expansion

34% of organizations

Organizations expanding their VM footprint

Key Terms

hypervisor, zero-trust

2 terms

hypervisor technical

"running directly on the hypervisor"

A hypervisor is software that creates and runs multiple virtual computers on a single physical server, like an apartment building that lets many households share one foundation while keeping each unit separate. Investors care because hypervisors improve hardware efficiency, lower operating costs, enable cloud services and scalable product offerings, and can be a source of licensing or support revenue—factors that affect profitability and competitive position.

zero-trust technical

"help organizations enforce zero-trust principles"

Zero-trust is a cybersecurity approach that treats every user, device and network connection as potentially risky and requires verification before granting access to data or systems. Like checking ID at every door instead of assuming people inside are safe, it limits what each user can reach and records access. Investors care because it lowers the chance and cost of breaches, supports regulatory compliance, and can protect a company’s reputation and financial value.

AI-generated analysis. How Rhea-AI works. Not financial advice.

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VM API Project Accepted into CNCF Sandbox to support Vendor-Neutral Kubernetes API for Virtual Machines

New Validated Partner Solutions Help Accelerate AI and Modern App Delivery

PALO ALTO, Calif., Nov. 09, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Today at KubeCon North America 2026, Broadcom Inc. (NASDAQ: AVGO), a global technology leader that designs, develops, and supplies semiconductor and infrastructure software solutions, announced the VM API project has been accepted into the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF) Sandbox. VM API enables virtual machines to be provisioned and managed through Kubernetes APIs across multiple heterogeneous infrastructure providers. Broadcom is also announcing the company is co-chairing the newly formed Workload Conformance Working Group within the Kubernetes community, with the goal of establishing a shared standard for how workloads run on Kubernetes. Additionally, more than 20 new partner solutions have been validated for VMware vSphere Kubernetes Service (VKS), giving customers greater choice and flexibility.

"For decades, VMware technology has set the standard for enterprise virtualization. Modern AI and agentic workflows now require VMs to operate within cloud-native ecosystems,” said Dilpreet Bindra, senior director of engineering, VMware Cloud Foundation Division, Broadcom. “As one of the top five long-term contributors to CNCF projects, we are not just users of Kubernetes; we are builders, and our efforts within the community are designed to help address modern challenges like this while making Kubernetes easier to run.”

Virtual machines remain a major part of enterprise application estates, even as organizations standardize on Kubernetes as an infrastructure control plane. The 2026 Virtual Machines Report from the Linux Foundation released today found that VMs account for 53% of production applications across the 492 practitioners surveyed, with most organizations expecting that share to hold steady.¹ Advanced AI workloads require the strict hardware isolation of VMs combined with the agility of containers, which is driving new demand: 34% of organizations expanding their VM footprint cite AI and agentic workloads as a contributing factor.

Today, Kubernetes-native VM management is largely associated with individual virtualization implementations. VM API enables virtual machines to be provisioned and managed through Kubernetes APIs, allowing VMs to participate in the same declarative infrastructure model used for containerized workloads. Moving VM API into CNCF stewardship creates an opportunity to develop a community-driven API and operating model for VMs that can be implemented across multiple infrastructure providers, expanding community participation in how VM lifecycle management evolves.

"By contributing the VM API project to CNCF, we are bringing that enterprise-grade reliability to the Kubernetes community,” Bindra continued. “Working closely with the CNCF community, we are establishing the open standard that makes VMs first-class citizens alongside containers, creating a single, unified control plane for the AI era."

“As enterprises scale AI and cloud-native initiatives, virtual machines and containers will continue to coexist,” said Matthew Flug, research manager, Intelligent Application Modernization and Deployment Platforms, IDC. “Certain workloads are better suited to containers and others to virtual machines; the priority for organizations is applying consistent governance and policy enforcement across both. Managing VMs and containers through the same control plane makes that consistency simpler for platform engineering teams to achieve. Conformance with open standards from the CNCF also helps mitigate vendor lock-in concerns as organizations decide how each workload should run.”

Advancing Workload Conformance in the Kubernetes Community

The Kubernetes community has programs today that certify a platform supports standard Kubernetes APIs and core container orchestration behaviors, and that a platform can run AI and machine learning workloads portably. No equivalent standard exists, however, for the workloads themselves. To help close that gap, Broadcom is supporting the newly formed Workload Conformance Working Group within the Kubernetes community. Broadcom (as VMware) previously helped pioneer Sonobuoy, the diagnostic engine behind the CNCF's Certified Kubernetes Conformance Program, and now will co-chair the new working group with the goal of establishing a shared, objective standard for how workloads run on Kubernetes. For customers, this means ISV applications can be deployed consistently across multi-vendor environments rather than certified individually for each platform. ISVs will benefit by conforming once instead of certifying against each platform vendor's solution separately. Read the full blog announcing the Workload Conformance Working Group here.

Expanding the Ecosystem of Partner-Validated Solutions for VMware vSphere Kubernetes Service

VKS is the CNCF-certified Kubernetes runtime built into VMware Cloud Foundation, running directly on the hypervisor so VMs, containers, and AI workloads share the same clusters and a single control plane without the additional infrastructure layer standalone Kubernetes distributions require. As organizations scale their Kubernetes deployments from day-one provisioning to day-two operations, platform engineering teams require more than just a runtime.

“Running a 24x7 emergency response center with a small IT team means we cannot afford complex infrastructure that requires constant manual intervention,” said Alexander Hopfgartner, Chief Technology Officer, Notruf Niederösterreich. “VMware vSphere Kubernetes (VKS) Service lets us spin up encapsulated environments and scale horizontally within hours of a major incident, without being locked into specific hardware. That flexibility is critical when lives depend on our systems staying available.”

Broadcom provides a comprehensive, flexible stack featuring an open ecosystem of partner-validated solutions for VKS to accelerate customer success. To support the critical layers of the modern cloud-native stack, VKS integrates with the tools on which customers already rely and the following partners have validated new solutions across observability, security, data and AI, application delivery, and storage.

• For observability, validated solutions from Datadog, Grafana Labs, New Relic, and Splunk by Cisco help platform teams continuously monitor, troubleshoot, and optimize their VKS workloads without altering their established workflows.
• On the security and compliance front, validations with CrowdStrike Falcon® platform, Sysdig, Tigera Lynx, and others help organizations enforce zero-trust principles and maintain a strong security posture across their entire fleet.
• For data-intensive and AI workloads, validated solutions such as Canonical Apache Spark and H2O AI Cloud help customers confidently deploy scalable, highly available applications on VKS.
• To accelerate developer velocity, streamline application delivery, and manage databases, validated solutions include Akuity Platform (built by the creators of Argo CD), Coherent Spark, KubeDB by AppsCode, and Siemens Mendix.
• For a well-architected, production-ready Kubernetes cluster, validated solutions include Traefik Labs for robust application networking, alongside Dell PowerProtect Data Manager and Scality RING for stateful workload storage and resilience.
  
  

Additional Resources

• Read Dilpreet Bindra’s blog detailing Broadcom’s CNCF contributions
• Read more about Broadcom’s VKS validations in this blog from Ahmar Mohammad, vice president,
• Learn more about VMware vSphere Kubernetes Service and VMware Cloud Foundation
• Follow VMware Cloud Foundation social channels on LinkedIn, X, formerly known as Twitter and YouTube

1-2026 Virtual Machines Report, Linux Foundation, November 2026. Survey of 492 practitioners conducted in September 2026. Report available at https://www.linuxfoundation.org/research/cloud-native-workloads-2026.

About Broadcom
Broadcom Inc. (NASDAQ: AVGO) is a technology leader that designs, develops, and supplies semiconductors and infrastructure software for global organizations' complex, mission-critical needs. Broadcom combines long-term R&D investment with superb execution to deliver the best technology, at scale. Broadcom is a Delaware corporation headquartered in Palo Alto, CA. For more information, visit www.broadcom.com.

Broadcom, the pulse logo, and Connecting Everything are among the trademarks of Broadcom. The term "Broadcom" refers to Broadcom Inc., and/or its subsidiaries. Other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. The information in this news release is for informational purposes only and may not be incorporated into any contract. There is no commitment or obligation to deliver any items presented herein.

Media Contact:

Roger T. Fortier
VCF Division, Broadcom
roger.fortier@broadcom.com
+1.408.348.1569

FAQ

AI-generated questions and answers. How Rhea-AI works. Not financial advice.

What is Broadcom's VM API project, and what did CNCF accept?

CNCF accepted Broadcom's VM API project into its Sandbox. VM API enables virtual machines to be provisioned and managed through Kubernetes APIs across multiple infrastructure providers.