Broadcom ceased selling VMware perpetual licenses after it purchased the virtualisation company in November 2023. Now it is sending cease-and-desist letters to the perpetual license holders.
Silicon giant Broadcom acquired VMware in late 2023 and controversially made numerous changes that some may describe as hostile to the once-loyal customer base. Broadcom cancelled partnerships, then invited select former partners to re-apply. It dramatically increased subscription prices, and it terminated perpetual licenses.
Those with existing perpetual licenses are, of course, free to keep using that software as long as they wish - but, Broadcom states, unless their contract entitled them to ongoing software patches, they are not entitled to any product updates. The catch here is that with the cessation of perpetual licenses, Broadcom also prevented perpetual licenses renewing their support agreements - unless they had carefully ensured perpetual ongoing product updates were included in their pre-existing contract.
Broadcom has over this last week now sent numerous cease-and-desist letters to those organisations who hold perpetual VMware licenses and have a lapsed support contract, asserting legal action if it finds they have downloaded and/or applied software updates to their VMware products in the time since their support agreement ended.
One such example is recounted on Reddit, with other customers telling similar stories across social media. Online sentiment indicates a belief Broadcom is flexing its legal muscles to persuade such VMware customers to pony up for a new subscription license, the only way they can regain support. However, in some cases the subscription pricing has increased by 300% or even more.
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