VMware intends to acquire early-stage Kubernetes security startup Octarine and also embed the Octarine technology into the VMware Carbon Black Cloud once the acquisition is closed.

The company made the announcement during Connect 2020, its annual cybersecurity user and partner conference (hosted virtually by VMware Carbon Black).

Announcing the acquisition deal, Patrick Morley, general manager and senior vice president, Security Business Unit, VMware, said: “Just over seven months ago, VMware acquired Carbon Black and announced our plans to be a major security provider with our intrinsic security strategy – protecting any application, running on any cloud, on any device. We’ve established a strong starting position. Today’s announcement reaffirms VMware’s continued commitment to investing in security.”

The company is yet to reveal the price of the acquisition deal.

“Acquiring Octarine will enable us to further expand VMware’s intrinsic security strategy to containers and Kubernetes environments by embedding the Octarine technology into the VMware Carbon Black Cloud,” Morley added. “This, combined with native integrations with Tanzu, vSphere, NSX and VMware Cloud Foundation, will create what we believe is a unique and compelling solution for intrinsically securing workloads. And, with the addition of our AppDefense capabilities merged into the platform, we can fundamentally transform how workloads are better secured.”

In an effort to empower modern SOC teams with the capabilities and context they need to improve both their efficiency and efficacy, VMware has also launched a Next-Gen SOC Alliance.

The alliance features Splunk, IBM Security, Google Cloud’s Chronicle, Exabeam, and Sumo Logic integrations with the VMware Carbon Black Cloud to deliver key XDR capabilities and context into SIEM technologies that power the modern-day SOC.