Take Five With Tom Fenton

The Five Stages of Grief: Coping with Broadcom's Acquisition of VMware

• By Tom Fenton
• 09/16/2025

After finishing my week at VMware Explore (you can read my recaps here, here, and here), it occurred to me that, after speaking with many end users, partners, and VMware employees, they are going through the Five Stages of Grief outlined by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross. This describes the emotional journey people go through when confronted with loss.

While discussing human mortality, the model proved remarkably applicable to corporate acquisition, especially when a larger entity (Broadcom) acquires a beloved technology company (VMware).

I do need to stress that VMware is not dead, nor is it dying. In fact, it is a strong, vibrant company that has a fair amount of autonomy from its parent company, Broadcom. However, it is a different company than it was before the acquisition.

For IT professionals, partners, and customers watching Broadcom integrate VMware, the comparison feels almost uncanny. To me and others, VMware has long been more than a company--it's been a community, an innovator, and in many ways the creator and backbone of modern virtualization and cloud infrastructure. Broadcom, by contrast, has a reputation for efficiency, financial discipline, and a primary focus on shareholder and customer value.

Therapists tell us the best way to cope is by acknowledging the five stages of grief as they manifest during this transition.

Stage 1: Denial
Initially, when Broadcom announced its $61 billion acquisition of VMware, many in the community were skeptical, as they felt that Broadcom didn't fully understand enterprise software. They pointed to their acquisitions of CA and Symantec, arguing that with VMware, it would need to be different.

Even when VMware announced some of the changes, some customers hoped their licensing models would stay intact, that perpetual licenses would continue, and that VMware's commitment to innovation would remain untouched. Partners convinced themselves that Broadcom wouldn't disrupt VMware's thriving ecosystem of resellers, consultants, and user groups. Employees reassured themselves that the VMware culture was too strong to be assimilated.

In short, denial was a warm, comfortable blanket that we wrapped ourselves in. VMware had defined virtualization and cloud management for decades--surely Broadcom wouldn't risk damaging such a strong brand, would they?

But denial and these false hopes didn't last long. Within months of the deal closing, layoffs began, perpetual licensing disappeared, and the restructuring of partner programs sent shockwaves through the channel. Reality of the deal had set in.

Stage 2: Anger
Once denial fades, anger takes its place. And make no mistake, the VMware community had plenty of it to go around.

Reddit and other community portals were filled with customers fuming about dramatically higher licensing costs as Broadcom pivoted to a subscription-only model. Long-time VMware champions in the EUC space were outraged when Horizon and other products were suddenly deprioritized, reshuffled, and/or sold off. Partners felt betrayed as decades of collaboration were cast aside in favor of a leaner, more transactional model.

Even employees, many of whom I know, had joined VMware precisely because of its culture of innovation, only to find themselves venting about Broadcom's engineering cuts and cost-driven focus. LinkedIn, Glassdoor, and other employee forums were filled with rants, memes, and thinly veiled criticisms.

Broadcom didn't blink. It maintained a stoic demeanor, repeating that the acquisition was about focus, profitability, and delivering value to its customers and stockholders. But many in the community felt the heart and soul were being ripped out of VMware.

This anger was both cathartic and unifying. But like all stages, it eventually gave way to something else.

Stage 3: Bargaining
After the shock and fury, a more pragmatic stage set in: bargaining.

Customers began asking if they could negotiate special pricing if they could bundle products, or if they shifted some workloads to VMware Cloud Foundation, would that lower their costs?

Many long-time partners of VMware have tried to find ways to stay relevant. If they pivoted to VMware's core portfolio and aligned with Broadcom's priorities, they might be able to maintain their seat at the table.

Even employees found themselves bargaining with themselves: If I stick around, maybe I'll land in one of the surviving business units. Or maybe Broadcom will spin off EUC, and I can transfer there.

This stage is where survival instincts kick in. Organizations reviewed contracts, explored hybrid approaches, and considered spreading workloads across multiple clouds to hedge their VMware risk. Some even explored alternatives, including Microsoft, Nutanix, Citrix, and open-source solutions like Proxmox.

The bargaining stage may not feel heroic, but it's where strategies are forged and new paths discovered.

Stage 4: Depression
Inevitably, the bargaining doesn't always work. And for many in the VMware orbit, this realization brought a sense of gloom.

For IT administrators who built their careers on VMware certifications, the uncertainty was disheartening. For long-time customers, the sense of loyalty and partnership they once felt had eroded. For partners, the financial math didn't add up.

The community felt disheartened and diminished. The culture of open collaboration and excitement around new product announcements was replaced by cautious corporate messaging and guarded optimism.

In this stage, the loss becomes personal. It wasn't just about licenses and contracts; it was about the erosion of an identity. VMware had been the underdog, the innovator, the company that challenged the old guard of IT infrastructure. Now it felt like just another brand under a massive corporate umbrella.

Depression is often the quietest stage. It's where the shock wears off and the weight of reality settles in.

Stage 5: Acceptance
And finally, there's acceptance.

Not everyone reaches it at the same pace, and many, perhaps most of the people I talked to, are in one of the four other levels of grief. But I am seeing more and more customers, partners, and employees adjust. Broadcom's model may be different, but it's also predictable. Although costs may be higher for some, organizations can plan and budget accordingly. One customer I spoke with suggested that, after weighing the alternatives, VMware may have been underpriced for a long time, and now it is time to pay the piper. Broadcom has made it clear that VMware Cloud Foundation will be the core platform for the future data center.

Partners recalibrate their portfolios. Employees who remain adapt to the new culture, while others move on to competitors or startups, bringing VMware's DNA into new ventures. While others, long-term VMware employees, accepted buyout offers and have retired.

And the IT community itself finds balance. VMware's role in the industry may have changed, but the reality is that virtualization is no longer the cutting-edge technology it once was. Containers, Kubernetes, AI-driven infrastructure, and multi-cloud strategies are the new frontiers. Broadcom's VMware may not be the dreamer it once was, but the dream of innovation continues, just in different products, as VMware brands VCF 9 as the platform for private AI, and it puts containers and Kubernetes on the same plane as virtual machines.

Acceptance doesn't mean forgetting the past. It means integrating the loss into a new reality. VMware will always be remembered as a trailblazer, and Broadcom's stewardship of the company, whether loved or loathed, is simply the next chapter in its story.

Final Thoughts
The five stages of grief remind us that corporate acquisitions are not just financial transactions; they're personal and emotional events for the people who have invested their time, careers, and trust in a company. Broadcom's acquisition of VMware has been one of the most significant events in IT history, forcing the VMware community to confront its emotions head-on.

Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance--each stage has played out across boardrooms, data centers, social media feeds, and, most importantly, in pubs around data centers and in tech centers worldwide. While the future of VMware under Broadcom may not resemble its past, the community that has grown around it remains strong, adaptable, and forward-looking.

Just to be clear, VMware isn't dead or dying, far from it. It remains a strong and energetic company with considerable independence under Broadcom. Sure, it's not the same VMware as before the acquisition, but that's not a bad thing, as all things evolve, and this evolution often brings on the need to accept.

(Editor's Note: more on this from Joey D'Antoni in the article, "6 Enterprise Strategies to Navigate the Post-Broadcom VMware Mess").