Microsoft wants to make service mesh invisible
From The New Stack Podcast by The New Stack
April 8, 2026 · 21 min · Episode 1603
About this episode
Mitch Connors from Microsoft discusses the vision to make service meshes invisible to users at KubeCon EU 2026.
At KubeCon EU 2026, Mitch Connors of Microsoft outlined a vision to make service meshes effectively invisible to users. Now working on Azure Kubernetes Application Network, a fully managed service built on Istio’s ambient mode, Connors aims to deliver core capabilities like mTLS without requiring users to engage with the complexity traditionally associated with service meshes. Ambient mode eliminates sidecar upgrade challenges by shifting functionality to node-level and waypoint proxies, though adoption still faces hurdles, including lagging CVE patching.
People in this episode
Guest: Mitch Connors
Topics covered
- service mesh
- Kubernetes
- cloud computing
- infrastructure
- mTLS
- technology
Keywords
- service mesh
- Kubernetes
- Azure
- Istio
- mTLS
- ambient mode
- CVE patching
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: Microsoft, Azure Kubernetes Application Network, Istio
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