Broadcom’s Tanzu platform-as-a-service (PaaS) gained agentic AI-focused security features as part of its latest update, providing users with a “secure-by-default agentic runtime” to support delivery of autonomous AI application development and deployment, and further bolstering Tanzu’s standing within the VMware hierarchy.

Tanzu is Broadcom’s pre-engineered PaaS designed to run on top of its halo VMware Cloud Platform (VCP) or any infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) platform. It stands apart from the VMware Kubernetes Service (VKS), which is a Kubernetes runtime and orchestration service that is included in VCF.

The latest Tanzu updates are part of the platform’s 10.4 release, which is highlighted by what Tanzu Division GM Purnima Padmanabhan described as “a new agent foundation.” This foundation is based on an “agent runtime” that possesses a hand full of “tenets” targeted at better securing AI-based application development with minimal added friction.

Padmanabhan explained that the first tenet is that applications are deployed in a “sandbox container, resource limited by CPU and memory,” where “if an agent becomes runaway, automatically it'll get throttled.” Provisioning of that application is also set to “deny by default so the agent cannot now tunnel in and start doing cryptomining. It's deny by default, so it'll always be locked into that.”

The next set of tenets is that specific access to applications is limited to “bind operations,” and usernames and passwords for credentials are not stored within that containerized application but instead in the underlying platform. “All the credentials will be managed separately so one agent cannot use the credentials of something that it's got access to to use something else,” Padmanabhan said.

The final set of tenets provides for full auditing of what is happening inside of that container, “so you can actually track back to what happens,” Padmanabhan said. And, anything that can be injected into that container will be controlled through the build process.

“We are saying we won't trust CI/CD (continuous integration/continuous deployment),” Padmanabhan said. “You will take code directly, and the platform will take care of doing that secure build so nothing can be contaminated, it's always dependent on the code. That is what the agent runtime does.”

More security between layers

These updates rely heavily on a bolstered underpinning. Tanzu – as a PaaS – can run on top of different infrastructure architectures and now has new features to help secure interactions.

Padmanabhan said these bolstered supply chain channels include trusted buildpacks that can build automatically patched and verified agent containers; use the Spring AI open source project and guardrails to help counter code drift; have a model context protocol (MCP) broker to help manage data between AI platforms; and taps the Tanzu Data Intelligence offering “that allows for out of the box data ingestion, ability to transform the data, ability to save that data into this with the out-of-the-box database-as-a-service.”

Some of those features come from previously launched Tanzu updates, including that Data Intelligence offering unveiled last August tied to Broadcom’s annual VMware Explore event; and an AI-focused update from early last year that included support for Anthropic’s MCP implementation to connect enterprise data and systems, a move targeted at helping Tanzu customers in building AI and agentic applications as part of agentic workflows.

Tanzu 10.4 also includes new ongoing support updates that can leverage VCF IaaS APIs to further abstract underlying complexity and tap into VKS to support scalable marketplace services.

Matthew Flug, research manager at IDC, noted in a statement tied to the update that Tanzu can help organizations bolster their agentic AI initiatives, and “move from a crawl phase to a walk phase.”

Tanzu tightens its position

Padmanbhan said the Tanzu update targets deployments through a “full private cloud stack,” which could conveniently be running on VCF.

“The public clouds may figure out how to solve it, but what we are doing is we will solve it for a full private cloud stack. That will be our unique value proposition: An agentic AI stack that is truly secure on private cloud, sitting on VMware Cloud Foundation, but that includes all the Data Intelligence pieces to clean your data so your data sovereignty is there, and Tanzu platform giving you that secure place to run your regions,” Padmanbhan explained.

And while the updates can tap into Broadcom’s VCF and VKS offerings, Padmanabhan noted that they were also “massive” in terms of continuing to build momentum behind the Tanzu platform.

“Across Broadcom now everybody has realized, and there's consistent opinion, that when we go to customers, we can't just sit in infrastructure. We have to be applications,” Padmanabhan said. “Tanzu is that application tip-of-the-spear between Spring and Tanzu platform. And more importantly, we need to have a PaaS, and Tanzu is the answer, the only answer, so there's no duplication. VCF gives you the IaaS and Kubernetes-based CaaS (container-as-a-service), and Tanzu gives you the PaaS.”

Broadcom has continued to roll out Tanzu updates since acquiring the platform as part of its VMware acquisition. However, it has also at times taken a back seat to VKS at Broadcom events, specifically the last Explore conference.

Padmanabhan at that time told SDxCentral that while she wanted Broadcom CEO Hock Tan to shine more of a spotlight on Tanzu, it was important for Broadcom to win in the private cloud space.

“This show is the VCF show, and Hock’s theory is if he doesn’t win the private cloud, all the castles we build on top of private cloud will come crashing down.”

This meant Tan had to “strip out everything and made it purely a private cloud show so that he could create feedback on private cloud,” Padmanabhan added.

The latest updates hint at momentum swinging back to Tanzu and its position within that VMware stack.

“So now you say, ‘OK, I've got a PaaS. The best place to run my agentic apps is a PaaS.’ That's what we established,” Padmanabhan said of how the recent Tanzu updates position the platform. “Now you can run your models on CPUs and GPUs and IaaS, but you broker it through the PaaS for applications. So both VCF and Tanzu platform have natural roles, but they become very clearly defined for a customer and for the value proposition we are driving into the market.”