Broadcom's KubeCon push

Broadcom went to KubeCon Europe in Amsterdam in March 2026 with a simple pitch: companies trying to run artificial intelligence inside their own data centers need one stack that handles virtual machines, containers, and policy in the same place. Broadcom tied that pitch to VMware Cloud Foundation, its private-cloud platform built around the VMware business it bought in late 2023. (news.broadcom.com) (nextplatform.com) Kubernetes is the software layer many companies use to run containers, which are packaged applications that can move between servers like standardized shipping boxes. Broadcom’s argument is that most big companies do not want a separate box yard for containers and another one for older virtual-machine software, so it is pushing VMware Cloud Foundation as the yard that holds both. (blogs.vmware.com) (nextplatform.com) That message comes after a bruising two years for VMware customers. Broadcom’s acquisition closed in November 2023, and customers then faced a shift from perpetual licenses to subscriptions, with some reported price increases running from 300 percent to more than 1,000 percent. (nextplatform.com) At KubeCon, Broadcom tried to show it was not just defending old VMware turf. It said VMware vSphere Kubernetes Service 3.6 adds longer support timelines, upgrade improvements, performance tuning, and partner integrations with F5, Kong, and Tigera for networking and security around Kubernetes clusters. (news.broadcom.com) (siliconangle.com) It also pushed Velero, a backup and recovery project for Kubernetes, into Cloud Native Computing Foundation sandbox governance. That move matters because Broadcom is telling developers that a tool for saving cluster state and moving workloads between environments should live under community rules, not just one vendor’s control. (news.broadcom.com) Broadcom has been building the artificial-intelligence layer underneath this story for months. In August 2025, it said VMware Private AI Services would become a standard part of VMware Cloud Foundation 9.0, with built-in pieces for model storage, model runtime, vector databases, data indexing, and an agent builder for internal artificial-intelligence systems. (news.broadcom.com) The new automation piece is Automic Automation v26, announced on April 10, 2026. Broadcom says it can generate workflows from text, plug into outside models through Model Context Protocol, and wrap every artificial-intelligence action in role-based access controls, audit logs, and policy checks so an “agent” cannot quietly change production systems without leaving a trail. (vmblog.com) (sdxcentral.com) That governance theme is doing a lot of work in Broadcom’s pitch. A large language model can suggest actions, but a bank, hospital, or government agency still needs a control room that decides who approved the action, what system it touched, and how to roll it back if it fails, and Broadcom wants VMware Cloud Foundation plus Automic to be that control room. (vmblog.com) (news.broadcom.com) Then Broadcom zoomed out from software to raw infrastructure. In disclosures reported on April 8, 2026, Broadcom, Google, and Anthropic expanded their collaboration so Anthropic will access about 3.5 gigawatts of next-generation Google Tensor Processing Unit compute through Broadcom starting in 2027, while Broadcom also signed a long-term agreement to develop and supply future generations of Google’s custom artificial-intelligence chips. (sullcrom.com) (techwireasia.com) So the KubeCon push was not just a conference booth story. Broadcom is trying to sit in two expensive parts of the artificial-intelligence stack at once: the software layer that governs how enterprises run private artificial intelligence, and the hardware supply chain that feeds hyperscale compute deals measured in gigawatts and multi-year chip programs. (news.broadcom.com) (sullcrom.com)