VMware Explore 2025: The Private AI Secrets Nobody Else Is Telling You

AI is no longer theoretical. It's now a real architectural priority for enterprise IT. Over the past few years, AI has become a growing focus for me and many of the customers I support. From deploying on-prem LLMs to enforcing data privacy in regulated environments, the demand for secure, scalable AI infrastructure is only accelerating.
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That’s why I’ll be on the ground at VMware Explore 2025 in Las Vegas, zeroing in on the sessions that don’t just talk about AI. They show you how to build it. Here are the three most important Private AI sessions from the Explore Content Catalog, and why they should be on your schedule if you care about turning strategy into infrastructure.

INVB1432LV – Building Secure Private AI Deep Dive​

Why it matters:
This breakout session focuses on how to design and deploy a secure Private AI architecture using VMware Private AI Foundation with NVIDIA and VMware vDefend. If you're responsible for protecting data while enabling GenAI inside your private cloud, this session offers critical guidance. It walks through policy-based controls, real-time threat detection, and secure model deployment frameworks that align with both infrastructure and security teams.

Highlights:

• Building a Private AI environment with workload isolation, automated policy enforcement, and real-time segmentation using vDefend
• Enhancing AI model security through distributed firewalling and data protection
• Managing LLMs and inference workloads with Private AI Foundation with NVIDIA
• Designed for IT practitioners, architects, and security teams supporting regulated workloads

Key takeaway:
This session provides a practical and scalable reference architecture for securely operationalizing GenAI in the enterprise. If you're building AI-ready infrastructure on VCF, this is essential.

INVB1158LV – Accelerating AI Workloads: Mastering vGPU Management in VMware Environments

Why it matters:
NVIDIA GPUs are the foundation of AI performance, but mismanaging them can lead to poor utilization and project delays. This session offers tactical guidance for optimizing virtualized GPU resources within VMware Cloud Foundation.

Highlights:

• Real-world performance benchmarks using vGPU profiles, time-slicing, and Multi-Instance GPU (MIG)
• Best practices for DRS-based GPU placement and minimizing stun-time during vMotion
• Tools for monitoring GPU utilization, reservation planning, and advanced scheduling
• Optimizing both small-scale AI projects and large-scale LLM inference infrastructure

Key takeaway:
Whether you’re experimenting with AI or scaling enterprise inference pipelines, this session gives you the knowledge to fully unlock your GPU investment inside the VMware ecosystem.

CODEQT1641LV – Tales from Production: Debugging LLMs and GenAI Apps on VMware Tanzu

Why it matters:
GenAI is everywhere, but running it in production is a different challenge. This technical quick talk shares real-world experiences operating GenAI applications at scale using VMware Tanzu Platform and VMware Cloud Foundation.

Highlights:

• Operational tips on model selection, governance alignment, and platform fit
• Lessons learned from using inference engines like Ollama and vLLM
• Managing context window size, response time performance, and infrastructure bottlenecks
• Strategies to confidently deploy intelligent apps across private infrastructure

Key takeaway:
This session is a rare behind-the-scenes look at the infrastructure and DevOps practices that make GenAI sustainable in production. It’s not theory, it’s battle-tested advice from the field.

Putting It All Together

Private AI is no longer aspirational, it’s actionable. VMware Explore 2025 is delivering the technical depth, real-world guidance, and enterprise tooling needed to securely scale AI from the data center to the edge.

These sessions INVB1432LV, INVB1158LV, and CODEQT1641LV, offer proven frameworks and insights that are immediately applicable for IT leaders, architects, and practitioners. Whether you're optimizing GPU usage, enforcing AI data policies, or debugging production LLM workloads, these sessions will elevate your AI infrastructure strategy.

I’ll be attending VMware Explore 2025 in person and will continue sharing insights right here on Virtualization Velocity. If you're attending too, let’s connect, I’d love to trade notes and hear how you’re building real-world Private AI.

For related information on these topics:

• The Top 10 Sessions That Will Define VMware’s Future
• Architecting Agentic AI Workflows with Spring AI and Tanzu: From Chat to Action​