Broadcom makes U-turn on plan to serve top 2,000 VMware customers itself

Canalys Forums APAC Broadcom has revised its strategy to work directly with the top 2,000 "strategic" VMware users, and will instead focus on just 500 – a move that Canalys chief analyst Alastair Edwards described as "a U-turn."

Edwards told The Register the change was quietly announced at VMware's November Explore conference in Barcelona, after Broadcom realized many users are contemplating VMware alternatives amid licensing changes that have seen most customers face considerably increased costs when they renew subscriptions.

Speaking at the Canalys APAC Forum in Indonesia today, Edwards said Broadcom recognizes that its best defense against possible migrations is making sure customers implement its full private cloud bundles and see strong return on investment. Broadcom sees giving 1,500 big users back to partners as the way to make that happen, and is even giving its channel 15 percent of the value of deals they win to fund professional services so that VMware software is quickly made operational.

Edwards described the changes as a "definite re-think."

VMware distributor TD Synnex yesterday praised Broadcom's approach. Reza Honarmand, senior veep for Global Hybrid Cloud and Transformation, yesterday told The Register Broadcom is unafraid to quickly change plans to improve them – especially after feedback from stakeholders. Honarmand said the Broadcom people he's worked with are very smart and driven to succeed, and that news of VMware migrations like UK cloud Beeks's shift to OpenNebula aren't an indication of mass exodus, but an everyday occurrence amid the cut and thrust of the tech biz.

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Canalys's Edwards agreed that momentum for migrations away from VMware remains modest.

But Dell's chief partner officer Denise Millard used her Canalys Forum keynote Q&A session to suggest VMware customers are doing more than just think about alternatives.

Millard said customers are asking "What do I do?" when it's time to renew VMware licenses. "Am I going to stay on VMware, or am I going to shift or am I going to have a hybrid model?"

Millard said many decide they need the best of both worlds.

"Customers are saying they want investment protection," Millard observed, as they feel a single integrated stack no longer offers the efficiency they need, and are willing to mix vanilla servers running different hypervisors and converged stacks.

Mixing things up, Millard suggested, protects customer investments by avoiding lock-in. She also observed that helping VMware users to plan their next move is a nice opportunity for services orgs – the audience at the Canalys event.

Dell will happily sell whatever VMware users want – virtualization stacks from Red Hat, Nutanix, or VMware – and its own servers, natch.

Edwards has written that Broadcom's changes at VMware came "at the expense of customer and partner relationships" and said he is unsure if it has done enough to turn the tide. ®