A look at VMware one year after Broadcom's acquisition: some customers say costs have risen 300%, Broadcom stopped selling perpetual VMware licenses, and more
Ars speaks with users and partners unhappy with Broadcom's changes. … After closing a $69 billion deal to buy virtualization … Forums: Slashdot and Ars OpenForum Forums: Msmash / Slashdot : 300% Price Hikes Push Disgruntled VMware Customers Toward Broadcom Rivals Ars OpenForum : A year after Broadcom's VMware buy, customers eye exit strategies
Context & Ripple Effects
Broadcom’s post-deal VMware strategy was established early: the company ended perpetual licensing and shifted the portfolio to subscriptions, then publicly acknowledged customer and partner unease months later in its response to the backlash. This report supplies the customer-level evidence of how those changes are being experienced a year into the integration.
The issue matters because VMware is embedded in existing enterprise infrastructure. Customers weighing an exit must compare sharply changed commercial terms against the cost, risk and time of replacing an incumbent platform.
First-order effects
- Affected VMware customers face higher reported software costs and fewer licensing choices, pushing renewals and infrastructure planning into immediate review.
- Broadcom concentrates VMware sales around subscription bundles, while dissatisfied users and partners begin evaluating rival platforms and exit paths.
Second-order effects
- Virtualization competitors gain a clearer opening with accounts whose budgets or procurement rules no longer fit VMware’s new terms.
- Migration advisers, systems integrators and cloud providers can see more demand from customers assessing alternatives, even where switching remains difficult because of installed VMware estates.
Third-order effects
- If these account-level exits persist, enterprise virtualization could shift from a long-standing incumbent relationship toward a more fragmented, subscription-led market.
- The episode highlights how post-acquisition customer unease can become a durable commercial constraint: pricing power may raise near-term revenue per customer while accelerating evaluation of substitutes among the most exposed accounts.
The trend: This is one instance of infrastructure-software owners using licensing consolidation and subscription bundles to monetize installed bases, testing customers’ willingness and ability to absorb switching costs.