Should I Stay or Should I Go Now? Navigating VMware’s New Licensing Model Under Broadcom

The Backstory: A Punk Rock Parallel

Let’s rewind with a brief (and surprising) musical analogy. The Clash’s 1981 hit “Should I Stay or Should I Go” resurfaced in pop culture thanks to a Levi’s commercial a decade later.

That song—born from a complicated relationship—mirrors what many of us feel about VMware today: a long-standing, trusted partner that suddenly feels…complicated. Do we stick with what we know, despite higher costs and uncertain roadmaps, or take the plunge into unfamiliar (but potentially promising) alternatives?

VMware’s Licensing Shake-Up: What’s New?

The Broadcom-era licensing revamp boils down to simplification—on paper—and complexity in practice. VMware has reduced its sprawling portfolio into four core subscription offerings:

• vSphere Standard & Enterprise Plus – Core hypervisor offerings without advanced services.
• VMware vSphere Foundation (VVF) – Adds Kubernetes via Tanzu (VKS), Aria Operations, and 250GiB/core of vSAN storage.
• VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) – Bundles everything in VVF and ups vSAN capacity to 1TiB/core. Add-ons include NSX Advanced Firewall, load balancing (via Avi), and Live Recovery.
• VCF Edge – Same VCF functionality but tailored for edge deployments, but with minimums (8 site minimum, 256 cores max per site)

But here’s the catch: Broadcom is strongly incentivizing customers into the VCF/VVF bundles, often discouraging lower-tier options outright. On top of that, new purchasing minimums (72 cores), late renewal penalties (20%), and increasingly bundled features introduce both sticker shock and operational constraints.

If You Stay: Optimize, Consolidate, Plan

If sticking with VMware is the right call for your org, here’s how to make it work:

1. Inventory and Assess

• Document every host, site, and workload.
• Understand what features (vSAN, NSX, Aria, etc.) you actively use or plan to use in the future.
• Evaluate your current entitlement and renewal timelines.

2. Right-Size Your VMs

• Core-based licensing penalizes VM sprawl.
• Rightsizing can drastically reduce unnecessary licensing costs.
• Tools like VCF Operations can help automate recommendations.

3. Modernize Where Possible

• Upgrade to vSphere 8 to unlock performance improvements.
• Consider reducing host counts at edge locations from 3 to 2 (where supported) to lower core counts.

4. Maximize Your Bundle

• You’re paying for advanced features—use them.
• NSX for microsegmentation, VCF for ops visibility, and Live Recovery for DR.

5. Lock in Multiyear Discounts

• While upfront cost is higher, a 3- or 5-year term protects against looming price hikes.

If You Go: Explore Alternatives

Leaving VMware isn’t just a licensing change—it’s a platform shift. Here’s what to consider when evaluating exit strategies:

Core Questions to Ask

• What’s your timeline for renewal and migration?
• How much refactoring would your applications require?
• What’s the impact on staffing, support, and tools?
• Can your hardware support the new platform?

Hypervisor Alternatives

**These are by no means all the alternatives, but a few to consider**

Cloud-First Options

• Public cloud (AWS, Azure, GCP) can eliminate hypervisor management altogether.
  • Pros: agility, scalability, reduced data center overhead.
  • Cons: unpredictable costs, latency concerns, lock-in risk.

Security, Storage & Automation: Don’t Overlook the Ecosystem

Beyond the hypervisor, consider how you’ll:

• Replace NSX (Nutanix Flow, 3rd-party agents like Illumio or Guardicore).
• Handle storage (vSAN alternatives like Nutanix Files, HCI-native).
• Enable automation (Morpheus with HPE, Terraform/Ansible with OpenStack).

The Real Cost: It’s More Than Licensing

Switching platforms impacts:

• People – Retraining admins and support staff
• Processes – New tooling, support workflows, and policies
• Performance – Uncertain until properly benchmarked
• Productivity – Migration efforts can disrupt day-to-day ops

VMware may be expensive—but so is a miscalculated re-platforming.

Final Thoughts: The Art of the Decision

There’s no one-size-fits-all answer. Staying with VMware could bring stability, especially with careful rightsizing and multiyear planning. Leaving may offer cost savings and architectural freedom but comes with risk and overhead.

Your next step? Inventory your environment, map your priorities, and evaluate both the technical and business implications. Then decide if you should stay or go.

Want help making the call? Reach out to our team for a VMware Optimization Assessment or to explore hands-on demos of alternative platforms.