What is VMware’s "Anywhere Workspace"?

Anywhere Workspace is a new offering from VMware that bundles together three existing tools from its portfolio with the aim of simplifying the management of remote worker devices and applications.

Providing secure access to vital applications has been a key challenge for businesses forced to adapt to remote working during the pandemic. And this change has exposed weaknesses in IT operations and business infrastructures, especially around how end-user workspaces or working environments are handled.

In response to these challenges, VMware has launched the Anywhere Workspace platform to help companies deliver better and more secure experiences to their employees, no matter where they are in the world, claiming it is the only solution of its kind on the market.

Essentially, it is designed to solve three problems: managing remote and hybrid-remote employees, improving edge security, and automating workspaces.

Anywhere Workspace does this in a zero-trust environment by combining three existing VMware tools:

• VMware Workspace ONE - a digital platform that securely delivers and manages any app on any device by integrating app access management, unified endpoint management and real time application delivery
• VMware Carbon Black Cloud - a cloud native security solution that delivers endpoint protection by consolidating multiple endpoint security capabilities using a single console
• VMware SASE - a platform that combines SD WAN with cloud delivered security to provide flexibility, agility and protection for enterprises of all sizes

The fundamental principle of Anywhere Workspace is that it’s built on integration points between these three products. For example, Carbon Black and Workspace ONE deliver physical and virtual endpoint security and management under one umbrella, whilst Workspace ONE and SASE deliver zero-trust network access with security at the point of presence. More integrations are planned going forward.

“Work is what you do, not where you do it,” said VMware Chief Operating Officer, Sanjay Poonen. “We developed VMware Anywhere Workspace with this new way of working in mind. It will play an important role in creating stronger and more focused businesses.”

Anywhere Workspace will be available on-premise, in the cloud and in a hybrid model, and supports AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, Oracle Cloud and other products.