This week, Midokura announced $20.4M in Series B funding for its network virtualization technology platform, Midokura Enterprise MidoNet. Midokura Enterprise MidoNet delivers an enterprise-grade, virtualized networking solution for IaaS infrastructures including, but not limited to OpenStack. Midokura’s virtualized networking solution claims advantages in comparison to the Open vSwtich (OVS) plugin with respect to scalability, performance, security and monitoring functionality. Midokura Enterprise MidoNet 5.0, for example, features enhanced analytics into network flows through physical and virtual hosts, thereby empowering customers to swiftly identify and remediate issues within network infrastructures. Midokura’s Series B funding round investors included Simplex Inc. as well as existing investors Innovation Network Corporation of Japan and a member of Midokura’s board of directors, Allen Miner. The funding raise constitutes emphatic affirmation of Midokura’s business model of delivering enterprise-grade support and services around its open sourced MidoNet platform and a current customer base that includes Dell, Overstock.com and Puppet.
Category: Midokura
Midokura Becomes OpenStack Corporate Sponsor As OpenStack Community Embraces More Networking Options
Network virtualization startup Midokura joined the OpenStack Foundation on Tuesday as a corporate sponsor. Midokura is the steward behind the open source software-defined, networking platform MidoNet that delivers virtualized networking solutions for IaaS platforms such as OpenStack. Midokura open-sourced its MidoNet platform in November 2014 with the intent of democratizing access to its virtualized networking solutions while concurrently launching an enterprise-grade version of MidoNet that includes a layer of professional services aimed at production deployments. Midokura’s MidoNet platform claims scalability, performance and security advantages over the Open vSwitch (OVS) plugin provided by OpenStack. In a press release, Midokura remarked on the value of MidoNet to OpenStack deployments as follows:
As the OpenStack project now hits its five-year mark, nearly two-thirds of users recently surveyed by the OpenStack Foundation still have concerns about OpenStack Neutron. Midokura’s disruptive MidoNet technology fulfills this need by replacing the default OVS plug-in from OpenStack deployments to offer a much more scalable and efficient networking solution for highly virtualized cloud environment. The result is that OpenStack users can easily support production-grade deployments to fulfill explosive enterprise demands – all while benefiting from the freedom of open source by forgoing the need to lock in with a single private vendor.
Here, Midokura highlights the scalability benefits delivered to OpenStack deployments by MidoNet, particularly as it relates to environments with “explosive enterprise demands.” MidoNet decouples OpenStack from network infrastructures by creating an abstraction layer that lies between the physical network and hosts. As a result, users can create a distributed overlay networking infrastructure that allows for changes to the virtual network without corresponding disruptions to the physical infrastructure of the network. The larger significance of MidoNet is that it gives OpenStack customers an enhanced range of options regarding scale-out networking solutions, while remaining true to OpenStack’s open source philosophy and vision. By joining OpenStack as a corporate sponsor, Midokura stands to strengthen its already deep and collaborative relationship with the OpenStack Foundation and position itself more strongly to render MidoNet the de facto networking solution of choice for the OpenStack community.
Midokura Releases Enterprise-Grade MidoNet Marked By Support For IaaS Platforms In Addition To OpenStack
On Wednesday, Midokura announced the latest release of its Midokura Enterprise MidoNet (MEM) platform that delivers network virtualization for IaaS clouds. Wednesday’s release constitutes the first major release since Midokura’s decision to open source its network virtualizaton technology in November. MEM supports not only OpenStack but also VMware vSphere and Red Hat Enterprise Linux OpenStack Platform 6 as illustrated below:
The innovation of this commercial release consists of the platform’s deep integration with additional IaaS platforms such as VMware vSphere, for example, which subsequently allows enterprises to use MidoNet for both proprietary and OpenStack-based IaaS deployments as evinced in hybrid cloud infrastructures, for example. Co-founder and CEO of Midokura Dan Dumitriu remarked on the significance of MEM’s support for platforms beyond OpenStack as follows:
Our latest Enterprise MidoNet release marks the next step in our product evolution by offering support for platforms that are already proven and well-entrenched in modern enterprise data centers. The result is that businesses can make the most of their technology investments with Midokura’s open, scalable network virtualization for heterogeneous hypervisors and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) clouds.
As Dumitriu notes, the most recent release of MidoNet throws open the door for MidoNet to be used in a variety of datacenters that collectively leverage “heterogeneous hypervisors” for their IaaS platforms. MidoNet’s decision to support a variety of IaaS frameworks means that, while it stands to benefit from its early traction amongst the OpenStack community, it also now positions itself to support a more diverse range of cloud platforms and amalgamations of IaaS infrastructures and subsequently make an even stronger case for its prominence amongst OpenStack deployments by virtue of its extensibility to other environments that may variously complement OpenStack. As of this release, MEM also supports OpenStack Juno and includes enhancements such as Load Balancing as a Service for the OpenStack Neutron project. Available immediately, Midokura is offering a 30 day free trial of MEM including enterprise-grade support and the MidoNet Manager interface.
Midokura Open Sources Its Network Virtualization Technology For IaaS Platforms
Midokura today announces its decision to open source the source code for its MidoNet network virtualization technology by means of an Apache 2.0 license. The open sourcing of Midokura’s MidoNet platform means that the OpenStack community now enjoys enhanced access to MidoNet’s distributed, software-defined, networking platform that specializes in distributed overlay networking. Midokura’s decision to open source MidoNet responds to fragmentation within the OpenStack community with respect to the selection of networking technologies for the OpenStack platform. Whereas OpenStack users have tended to adopt Ceph for storage purposes, the selection of networking vendors has failed to achieve consensus or critical mass such that Midokura decided to render MidoNet a community-driven, virtualized networking project that could benefit from the contributions of the entire OpenStack community as told to Cloud Computing Today by Midokura General Manager Adam Johnson. Meanwhile, Midokura launches an Enterprise MidoNet solution that wraps a layer of professional services and customer support around the MidoNet platform for customers that require a truly enterprise-grade deployment of the MidoNet platform. In all, Midokura’s decision to open source MidoNet constitutes yet another disruptive, hugely significant moment in the history of OpenStack given that Midokura has positioned MidoNet strongly as a platform with the potential to acquire the status of the best of breed, de facto virtualized networking solution for the OpenStack community. As an open source collaboration, MidoNet will focus on delivering a production-grade networking solution built from a diverse spectrum of contributors and founding members of its open source community. Expect more details of the governance structure of MidoNet to emerge in coming weeks although, in the meanwhile, MidoNet’s source code is available on GitHub alongside further details at the MidoNet community website.
Midokura Partners With Cumulus Networks To Bridge Virtualized and Physical Infrastructures
Network virtualization vendor Midokura recently announced details of a partnership with Cumulus Networks that expands its ability to connect virtual, software defined networks to physical infrastructures and workloads. Midokura’s Midonet platform is a distributed, software-defined, networking platform that specializes in virtualized networking in a space that features the likes of Juniper Contrail, PLUMgrid, and VMware NSX. Cumulus Networks, meanwhile, offers Cumulus Linux, a Linux-based operating system for networking hardware. Whereas Midokura’s Midonet platform previously was able to connect virtualized networking infrastructures to non-virtualized infrastructures by way of its support of Layer 2 Gateway technology, its partnership with Cumulus Networks expands its ability to support non-virtualized infrastructures by adding enhanced speed, automation, scalability and performance to the connection between virtualized and physical workloads. Midonet connects to physical network switches that reside within a Cumulus Linux-based OS by means of a VxLAN Tunnel Endpoint (VTEP) gateway.
Because VxLAN represents an industry standard networking technology, Midokura’s partnership with Cumulus Networks affirms its commitment to supporting industry protocols that mitigate against proprietary networking protocols and operating systems that encourage vendor lock-in. Overall, the Midonet collaboration with Cumulus Linux promises dramatic improvements in the speed, scalability, performance and simplicity of networking infrastructures. Midokura and Cumulus Networks plan to offer a preview of their partnership in May 2014 and a general availability release in Q3 2014. The partnership between the two companies promises to push the envelope with respect to open standards in software defined networking in addition to improving the economics of building large-scale networks that encompass a combination of virtual and physicalized infrastructures.
Midokura Releases Upgrade To Midonet With Support For Layer 2 Gateway And OpenStack Havana
Midokura today announced the latest release of Midonet, its software defined networking platform for IaaS infrastructures. MidoNet now integrates with OpenStack Grizzly and OpenStack Havana and supports Layer 2 Gateway networking. MidoNet’s support of Layer 2 Gateway means that customers can now “connect bare-metal servers to the overlay network” and thereby add physical networks to its network virtualization platform. The latest release also features an enhanced management console marked by the ability to understand how a virtualized network would operate if it had experienced a physical installation. In addition, today’s release boasts an enhanced command line in its web-based user interface. Midonet’s distributed, decentralized, software defined network virtualization platform represents an alternative to the Open vSwitch (OVS) Plugin provided by OpenStack. In an interview with Cloud Computing Today, Adam Johnson, General Manager of Midokura, notes that Midonet claims competitive advantages over OVS such as improved security, efficiency, scalability and performance as it strives to become the networking solution of choice for the OpenStack community.
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