Intermittent failure importing offline ESXi content into vSphere Lifecycle Manager

Products

• VMware
• VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

Symptoms:
Attempting to import an offline bundle into vSphere Lifecycle Manager right after the vCenter Server service (vpxd) or vSphere Lifecycle Manager service (vmware-updatemgr) has been restarted fails with the error:

Failed to upload Image...
or
Cannot find service

Environment

VMware vCenter Server 7.0.x

Cause

The issue is caused by API endpoint unavailability as the Lifecycle Manager has not completed the reboot process.

Resolution

To resolve this issue, wait for the vSphere Lifecycle Manager service to fully start. This is approximately 5 minutes after a reboot, at which point then re-try the import operation.