Cisco added new software-as-a-service (SaaS) and virtual-deployment options for its Tetration analytics platform. And it also launched an integrated data center security architecture that includes Tetration and other Cisco products: its next-generation firewall, Stealthwatch, and Application Centric Infrastructure (ACI).

Just last month Cisco added multi-cloud capabilities to Tetration, extending its reach beyond the data center and into the cloud. It uses software sensors to monitor and analyze workloads running on bare metal servers, virtual machines, and containers.

Companies can now purchase Tetration SaaS, a cloud-based option, or Tetration-V, a software-only version using a virtual appliance for smaller deployments. Both include the same functionality as the original on-premises Tetration.

The SaaS version allows companies to more quickly deploy the platform and scale as needed, said Yogesh Kaushik, director at Cisco Tetration Analytics.

“With a hardware or an on-prem model it still takes several days to weeks for customers to be up and running because hardware takes time to ship, etc.,” he said. “With SaaS they are up and running in hours. Customers buy no hardware whatsoever. And like any SaaS service it is elastic. They can go from 100 workloads up to 25,000 workloads.”

The SaaS model also includes data retention for months as well as built-in high availability and disaster recovery capability. Tetration SaaS will ship in May.

Tetration-V is available now. This model targets companies that deploy fewer than 1,000 workloads. The virtual appliance provides one-click deployment and allows organizations to use their own server and storage infrastructure.

Tetration is also one of the four Cisco products that comprise its integrated data center security architecture designed to protect workloads running in both on-premises data centers and in public, private, and hybrid clouds. The other three are the company’s next-generation firewalls, its software-defined networking (SDN) product ACI, and Stealthwatch, Cisco’s cloud-based behavior analytics and network visibility tool.

Additionally Talos, Cisco’s threat intelligence team, powers the threat sensors and ensures that the products work together to detect malware.

In a blog post, Cisco’s Gee Rittenhouse, SVP of engineering for security, writes that the new integrated architecture provides three key security benefits: better visibility, segmentation, and threat protection. Stealthwatch and Tetration provide visibility across networks, applications, users, and devices and use analytics to detect anomalies and threats.

Segmentation prevents attackers from moving laterally across servers or east-west traffic flows. The security architecture enforces segmentation at multiple areas, from the perimeter with Cisco’s firewalls to the application with Tetration.

And finally threat sensors in multiple products detect bad actors.

“This blog is showcasing that strategy of visibility, workload protection, and threat detection with a portfolio approach,” Kaushik said, adding that the integrated system solves another common problem. “Customers have between one and 20 security products within the data center, and all these products are siloed,” he explained.

The blog also points to Cisco’s push to sell its security products to IT and service providers, which can then sell the bundled products as managed security services to their customers. The blog includes quotes from three of these companies: Metanet Global, Dimension Data, and Telstra.