July 11, 2025
What is it?
The Palo Alto Networks Software Firewalls are virtualized next-generation firewalls designed to secure workloads in virtualized and cloud environments. These firewalls extend the company's security features into virtual environments and provide consistent protection for applications, data and users, regardless of location. With the advent of AI in the modern enterprise, Palo Alto Networks has released a Software Next-Generation Firewall specifically tailored to secure AI models within the enterprise.
Why should you care?
Cloud security: Protects applications and data in public and private cloud environments.
Data center security: Secures virtualized data centers by providing segmentation and protecting east-west traffic.
Remote access: Enables secure access for remote users and applications.
The Palo Alto Networks Software Firewall is ideal for organizations looking to implement consistent security policies across hybrid cloud environments and provides robust protection for their virtualized assets and applications.
AI security: Allows organizations to protect AI models from being poisoned or accessed by bad actors within the environment.
Centralized management: Offers the ability to manage multiple Palo Alto Networks products including software firewalls from one centralized location.
How does it work?
Palo Alto Networks Software firewalls can be deployed in various virtual and cloud environments to provide comprehensive security across different infrastructures.
- Public cloud (AWS, GCP, Azure, Oracle and IBM Cloud)
- Private cloud
- Virtualized data centers
- Hybrid cloud
- Container environments
- Remote and branch sites
Differentiation in the market
Palo Alto Networks Software Firewalls differentiate themselves with advanced security features that surpass the basic protections of cloud-native firewalls. They offer comprehensive threat prevention, detailed application control with App-ID, Content-ID and granular policy enforcement via User-ID. These capabilities allow for consistent security management across hybrid and multi-cloud environments, providing centralized control and integrated threat intelligence, making them ideal for organizations seeking enhanced, unified security across complex infrastructures.
How to position and sell
The Palo Alto Networks Software Firewall delivers enterprise-grade security through a flexible, software-based deployment model suitable for diverse environments including public clouds, private clouds and virtualized data centers. These virtualized firewalls are ideal for securing both North-South and East-West traffic. The flexible licensing model allows for adaptable deployments and allows customers to easily change their configuration.
These software firewalls are licensed by credits, which Palo Alto Networks conveniently supplies an easily accessible estimator to calculate the number of credits needed for a deployment.
More information
Arrow value add
Arrow Electronics provides training and enablement, helping partners generate pipeline and build customer confidence to accelerate sales. In addition, the Arrow Solutions Lab allows you to mix and match different components and test designed solutions in a real-world environment. These tools help customers make informed decisions. Finally Arrow has a deployment team ready to implement solutions for your customers to ensure the solution they are acquiring exceeds their expectations.
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