BARCELONA, Spain — VMware rolled out several updates targeting carriers’ network virtualization efforts and said Vodafone expanded its VMware cloud infrastructure footprint as it prepares to deploy 5G networks.

A day after VMware CEO Pat Gelsinger touted the operator as one of its top customers, the companies said that VMware is Vodafone’s primary strategic partner for telco cloud infrastructure services. This means VMware’s products and services are live in 15 countries, in more than 50 Vodafone sites, and carrying subscriber traffic on more than 300 core network functions.

VMware’s telco cloud platform is a single architecture that supports both 4G and 5G networks, which aims to make it easier for communication service providers to transition to next-generation mobile networks.

Vodafone started using VMware’s NFV platform in 2017. At the time, Gelsinger called it “our largest-ever telco deal.”

“The ability to be flexible and agile as we continue to automate our network operations and management could only be achieved through a software-defined infrastructure,” said Johan Wibergh, CTO of Vodafone Group. “We have been pleased with the accelerated time-to-market and associated economic benefits of our transition to NFV and, increasingly, a telco cloud infrastructure.”

VMware has forged several new service providers deals at MWC Barcelona. The company also announced a deal with AT&T under which the operator will integrate VMware’s VeloCloud SD-WAN with its 5G network. Deutsche Telekom-owned IT service provider T-Systems said it will provide its customers with a managed services offering for VMware Cloud on AWS. And last week VMware scored a deal with Ericsson that will allow service providers to deploy Ericsson’s virtualized network functions (VNFs) on VMware’s software-defined infrastructure.

The virtualization giant also today announced several updates to its telco cloud and networking products. It expanded its telco NFV portfolio to include assurance, automation, and migration capabilities that span physical and virtual networks. VMware Smart Assurance 10 will provide full integration with VMware vCloud NFV, VMware’s NFV infrastructure (NFVI) platform,

VMware also grew the number of partners that have been certified within the VMware Ready for NFV Certification program. This program provides CSPs with the commitment that VMware partner VNF solutions will seamlessly and deploy, run, and interoperate with VMware vCloud NFV. VMware now has certified more than 105 VNFs from 85 vendors worldwide.

And it also rolled out new capabilities in NSX, its networking and security portfolio. The latest release of NSX Data Center targets enterprises’ virtual cloud networking needs, while NSX-T Data Center focuses on communications services providers’ NFV efforts.

VMware first stated talking about its “Virtual Cloud Network” vision in May 2018. The idea is to provide consistent networking and security policy from the data center to the cloud and the edge.

“It’s programable and flexible to support the needs of a digital business, built for infinite scale but no longer limited by box or boundaries, with intrinsic security, consumed as a service,” said CEO Pat Gelsinger during his keynote at last year's Dell Technologies World. “Above all, it’s software-driven and enables consistency and elasticity. This is what we call the virtual cloud network.”

Today’s NSX releases are “about driving that vision forward,” said Thomas McCafferty, senior director of product marketing for VMware’s Networking Services.

NSX is deployed in 82 of the Fortune 100 businesses and 70 percent of Fortune Global 500, according to VMware. It also supports networking and security across Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, IBM Cloud, and VMware Cloud on AWS. The networking virtualization platform is embedded in VMware Cloud Foundation, VMware Cloud on AWS, VMware Enterprise PKS, VMware vCloud NFV, Pivotal Application Service, and in the future will be embedded in AWS Outposts and VMware Project Dimension.