What is the plan for TMG in the future? Will it vanish or will it just be a part of the next generation where TMG and UAG become one “Unified Gateway”?
Why suddenly ask these questions you might wonder, well…
The last Gartner report, published 25 May 2011, on Secure Web Gateways presents the following Maqic Quadrant for Secure Web Gateways.
Magic Quadrant for Secure Web Gateway
As you can see it does not list TMG and the report contains the following text:
“Microsoft has informed Gartner that it does not plan to ship another full version release of its SWG product, the Forefront Threat Management Gateway (TMG). The product is effectively in sustaining mode, with Microsoft continuing to ship Service Pack (SP) updates; the next one, SP2, is planned for 3Q11. Microsoft will also continue to support TMG for the standard support life cycle — five years of mainstream support and five years of extended support. In the SWG category, TMG will become less competitive over time, since Microsoft’s goal is not to compete head-to-head with other vendors in that space. We believe that Microsoft will repurpose TMG technologies in other products and services as part of its overall cloud strategy.”
I have spent the last few days trying to get some “official” comments on this from Microsoft but has so far failed. So we can only speculate what this means.
My speculation around this is that this is part of the cloud strategy as mentioned in the Gartner report and UAG is the gateway product prepared for the cloud. My guess and speculation is that this is not the end of TMG as function but maybe as standalone product. I think we will see TMG and UAG merge into one “Unified Gateway”.
[Update 2011-05-31]
During the last 48 hours I have recieved information leading me to believe my guess and speculation above is not entirely correct. The “truth” is not yet revealed but hopefully Microsoft realize that customers and partners are waiting for clarification on the product roadmap of TMG and UAG.
[End of Update]
As soon as any official statement is presented I will add that to this post.
[Update 2012-09-17]
Important changes to Forefront product roadmaps
[End of Update]
#1 by Kent on May 28, 2011 - 08:33
Deb Shinder also have some thaughts on this in http://blogs.isaserver.org/shinder/2011/05/27/death-of-tmg/
#2 by Matheus Cavalieri on May 31, 2011 - 19:27
So, no MS news yet?
#3 by Matthew on July 18, 2011 - 19:36
I think it”s disappointing that we don”t have clear strategic direction from Microsoft on this. It hurts the FF TMG vendors, partners, and Microsoft itself by reducing spending as well as implementation.
I think MS has to have a gateway play, since their push towards Windows 2008 virtualization in Hyper-V requires it for a strong offering in my opinion. But, I could be wrong I guess.
#4 by Jonas on August 31, 2011 - 17:27
Any official news yet?
#5 by Kent on September 5, 2011 - 06:20
Well Jonas and others… No news yet. It has been three months since the news from Gartner came out and still no official statement from Microsoft on the future of TMG. IMHO this is very poor partner/customer treatment!
#6 by bart on December 28, 2011 - 16:11
another 3 months and still no word from ms?
#7 by Scott Foster on December 28, 2011 - 23:07
What is the latest on MS TMG?
#8 by Jon Myer on January 16, 2012 - 18:09
Has anyone heard what is going on with TMG, has Microsoft given any hint what is going on? Or should we just assume that it won”t be rolled into another product, or released as standard with the server product…
MS really should comment on this, otherwise they may lose firewall/proxy customers, when there is no need to.
#9 by Bob Sweed on March 8, 2012 - 19:22
It”s March 2012 – any update
#10 by Kent on March 8, 2012 - 20:30
Not even a single hint
#11 by Tobias on March 11, 2012 - 03:45
According to this video Microsoft is phasing out their own TMG servers:
“The TMG product does not have a future product roadmap”
http://research.microsoft.com/apps/video/default.aspx?id=160581
#12 by Kent on March 11, 2012 - 13:08
Very interesting! Thanks for pointing this out Tobias.
#13 by WWahrman on June 8, 2012 - 14:26
Hi Tobias, i can not watch the video, can you put another link or tell me how can i watch it please.
#14 by Daniel on December 19, 2012 - 17:48
As we all know is the announcement made to discontinue TMG.
Of course is this leading to the question what with UAG, since it””””s build on top of it.
For UAG selve are some functions now core – meaning improved in – in Win 2012 (Like DirectAccess & RemoteAccess)