NetFoundry today extended its zero-trust networking software development kit (SDK) to customers building apps on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI).

The integration is built around NetFoundry's zero-trust and SDN products, and it allows software-as-a-service (SaaS) developers and independent software vendors (ISVs) to utilize the vendor’s zero-trust network access (ZTNA) functionality rather than have to develop it on their own.

“Those SaaS providers, enterprise IT, what they're realizing is: ‘Well, wait a minute. If I'm going to build a cloud-native application experience, I need to offer my users or my customers a full, cloud-native experience. I can't bolt on secure networking infrastructure. I can’t bolt on VPN firewalls, MPLS. I can’t bolt that on to a cloud-native app and expect it to deliver the full experience. I need to build in secure networking into my app,’” NetFoundry CEO Galeal Zino said in an interview with SDxCentral.

NetFoundry’s platform is cloud native and can be deployed using common orchestration tools like Hashicorp’s Terraform.

The SDK provides developers with software for certificate-based identify management, bootstrapped enrollment, bi-directional authentication, least-privileged access, microsegmentation, and encryption. Once the code is integrated into the application it can accelerate access to NetFoundry’s Fabric network — a core component of its secure access service edge (SASE) platform — to optimize application performance.

The result is that DevOps teams can build zero-trust security functionality directly into their application in a way that doesn’t rely on software agents.

Most ZTNA services today — including many SASE offerings — require either a domain name system redirect, as is the case with CloudFlare, or a software agent, like Cisco, Versa, or VMware, to establish a secure tunnel between the user and a cloud-based PoP.

The integration with Oracle eliminates the point of presence and moves the ZTNA functionality into the application where it can run as a cloud-native microservice that can scale across edge locations.

According to Zino, by moving zero trust into the application, developers don’t have to rely on enterprises or end users to implement a SASE architecture to benefit from a zero-trust architecture.

For most enterprises, SASE is a two- to five-year migration, he said. “If I'm an ISV or a SaaS provider. I need to sell now. I need to give you a secure user experience now. I don't want to be the Colonial Pipeline tomorrow.”

That’s not to say SASE and ZTNA don’t have a place in the enterprise environment, Zino notes.

He explained for enterprises shifting to the cloud, the company’s SASE offering provides secure access to existing applications and workloads. And to this end, NetFoundry announced a partnership with Oracle in April to make it easier to for OCI customers to take advantage of its SASE platform.

The integration enables customers to remotely access workloads running in OCI securely while adhering to zero-trust principles.

Zero trust, remote access, and, of course, SASE have become key talking points for Oracle in recent months.

In early April, Oracle penned a deal with Check Point to launch a SASE platform, making it one of the, if not the first, public cloud vendors to enter the space.

The collaboration paired much of Check Point’s cloud-delivered security functionality with Oracle’s Talari SD-WAN platform. However, in the background Oracle has been steadily bolstering its network security capabilities, with Doug Tait, director of product marketing for networks at Oracle, calling OCI the most secure public cloud.