vSphere 7 assist ends: the challenges of Broadcom’s new licensing and pricing fashions
After a few short years of sweeping change following Broadcom’s $61 billion acquisition of VMware, the enterprise technology market is still feeling the effects.
The semiconductor giant’s 2023 takeover ushered in widespread shifts across VMware’s products, pricing and portfolio.
Theater Chief Technology Officer, EMEA at Rimini Street.
Now, the October 2025 end of vSphere 7 support signals another fundamental shift in Broadcom’s business model. The company is undergoing significant changes, from licensing, packaging, pricing, GTM and the transition from perpetual licensing to subscription-based bundles.
For many businesses, these changes present more challenges to an already complex and evolving business software landscape.
While Broadcom’s new model consolidates VMware offerings, for IT management, this change also introduces new considerations around total cost of ownership, feature utilizations and the ability to scale licenses dynamically.
This has led to 98% of customers currently considering moving away from VMware altogether.
Licensing, pricing and packaging challenges have introduced greater complexity in budgeting cycles and procurement planning with some enterprises reporting substantial changes in renewal costs, driven by bundled packaging.
Since the acquisition of VMware, enterprises have reported spending 8-15 times more because of these challenges.
The nature of the rollout and the customer engagement strategy raise additional concerns among customers about future changes to costs and pricing.
Although there are alternatives on the market including Microsoft Hyper-V, Nutanix or various open-source models, a swift migration can add risks and greater costs.
Market Implications and What To Do Next
IT leaders are turning to alternative, proven paths to maintain vSphere 7 environments, keeping critical functions running, secure and stable as they navigate the continued vendor-driven changes that drive up costs and create uncertainty.
Third-party support allows enterprises to maximize the full value of existing VMware environments, and with the right partner, you gain expert technical resolution, hypervisor security solutions, vulnerability mitigation and greater peace of mind.
This strategy benefits enterprises with the ability to:
– Support existing vSphere 7 and vSphere 8 environments with technical expertise that keeps systems running smoothly and securely – eliminating unwanted pressure and buying time for strategic roadmap planning.
– Optimize existing IT infrastructure investments with strategic services and solutions that deliver unique hypervisor security, maintains compliance and allows for maximizing of VMware investments.
– Innovate with freed-up resources, turning cost savings into strategic investments that strengthen future readiness.
A Smarter Path Forward
As Broadcom redefines VMware’s pricing and support structure, organizations continue to seek out pragmatic alternatives to save time and money to be reinvested in strategic technological advancement strategies.
Today, enterprises face the end of vSphere 7 support and a rapidly shifting VMware landscape, so the priorities now are flexibility and control.
Broadcom’s new pricing and licensing model shows the risk of vendor-dependent modernization, highlighting the importance of agility and cost transparency for businesses who once relied on vendors for their long-term strategy.
Organizations that take an independent approach moving into the next decade of advancements, who assess current environments and leverage their core investments as long as they can, will be better positioned to navigate change.
Rather than reacting to change and continued upgrade cycles, IT leaders can chart a smarter path forward rooted in action, while preparing for the innovations of tomorrow with more flexibility than vendors offer.
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