SDDC Manager driven ESXi upgrades fail on clusters managed by vSphere Lifecycle Manager (vLCM) when NSX IDPS Turbo is enabled.

Products

• VMware vDefend Firewall
• VMware vDefend Firewall with Advanced Threat Prevention

Issue/Introduction

• This issue is only applicable to VCF 5.x to 5.y upgrades with Turbo mode IDPS.
• ESXi upgrade initiated from SDDC Manager fails.
• The task fails during image validation.
• An error similar to the following is observed in the UI or logs:

• The following errors can be observed in SDDC Manager LCM logs. 

  lcm.2025-xx-xx.0.log.gz: data = com.vmware.esx.settings.clusters.software.drafts.validate_result => {notifications=com.vmware.esx.settings.notifications => {warnings=[], errors=[com.vmware.esx.settings.notification => {retriable=<unset>, id=com.vmware.vcIntegrity.lifecycle.EsxImage.SolutionComponentNotFound, originator=<unset>, time=2025-xx-xxT12:29:19.174Z, message=com.vmware.vapi.std.localizable_message => {args=[nsx-lcp-bundle, VMware NSX-T], default_message=Component(s) nsx-lcp-bundle within software Solution VMware NSX-T cannot be found in depot., localized=<unset>, id=com.vmware.vcIntegrity.lifecycle.EsxImage.SolutionComponentNotFound, params=<unset>}, type=<unset>, resolution=<unset>}], info=[]}},

   

  lcm.2025-xx-xx.0.log.gz:com.vmware.xxx.sddc.lcm.model.error.LcmException: Unable to set NSX solution to desired state spec. Component(s) nsx-lcp-bundle within software Solution VMware NSX-T cannot be found in depot. Image is not valid.

Environment

VCF 5.x
NSX/vDefend 4.2.2 and above with Turbo mode

Cause

During vLCM cluster preparation, the "nsx-scx-vlcm-bundle" was correctly set in the desired state. However, during the upgrade, the SDDC Manager workflow is attempting to set the non-scx bundle "nsx-lcp-bundle" to the desired state instead. This discrepancy is causing the component clash.

Resolution

This issue is fixed in VCF 5.2.3

If upgrade is NOT an option

Perform ESXi Upgrade outside the SDDC Workflow

1. Do not use the SDDC Manager ESXi upgrade workflow for the affected cluster.
2. Perform the ESXi upgrade directly using vSphere Lifecycle Manager (vLCM):
           ○ Create or update the desired ESXi image in vLCM.
           ○ Apply the image to the cluster and complete the host upgrades successfully.
3. After the ESXi upgrade is complete, run an Inventory Sync in SDDC Manager

PR 3631740