IBM this week offered a sneak peek at what it says will address security issues in the virtualization world by early next year.

IBM plans to introduce the IBM Proventia Network Virtual Intrusion Prevention System appliance, its first software-based IPS designed to operate in VMware's ESX virtual-machine environment. IBM also expects to have virtual appliances for the Proventia Enterprise Scanner and the Proventia Multi-Function unified threat management later next year as well.

"We're calling this our 'Phantom' initiative," says Greg Adams, IBM's business line executive for network solutions, who describes it as a research initiative to optimize security software to work within virtual machine server environments, including those from VMware.

In addition, IBM introduced the IBM Proventia Network Security Controller, a security management appliance that can be used in load-balancing of existing Proventia appliances on high-speed networks of 1G to 10Gbps using active bypass capability. It's expected to cost $34,000 to $38,000 and be available the first quarter of next year.