By Jeff Carson and Konstantin Sotnikov

In the rapidly evolving world of cloud computing, stability and predictability are paramount. The recent acquisition of VMware by Broadcom has introduced a wave of uncertainty and operational shakeups, leaving many businesses scrambling to secure their IT environments. As organizations grapple with potential changes in licensing, support, and strategic direction, Amazon Web Services (AWS) Native emerges as a robust alternative, offering a seamless transition away from VMware’s uncertain future. ClearScale, with its deep expertise in cloud migration, stands ready to guide businesses through this transition, ensuring continuity, stability, and growth.

The Broadcom Effect: Uncertainty in the VMware Ecosystem

The acquisition of VMware by Broadcom has sent ripples through the tech industry. While mergers and acquisitions often promise enhanced capabilities and market reach, they can also bring about significant operational disruptions. Here are some of the key concerns that businesses are facing in the wake of this acquisition:

  1. Licensing Changes: Broadcom’s approach to licensing and pricing could differ significantly from VMware’s traditional models. Businesses fear potential increases in licensing costs and changes to the terms that could impact their IT budgets and operational flexibility.
  2. Support and Service Disruptions: Mergers often lead to restructuring and shifts in service and support models. Businesses reliant on VMware’s support infrastructure may experience delays, reduced service quality, or changes in support terms.
  3. Strategic Uncertainty: The strategic direction of VMware under Broadcom’s ownership is unclear. Businesses are concerned about the future roadmap for VMware products and whether they will align with their long-term IT strategies.
  4. Operational Disruptions: The integration of VMware into Broadcom’s existing operations may cause temporary or long-term disruptions. Businesses reliant on VMware for critical operations need to prepare for potential instability.

The fear, uncertainty, and doubt created in the market by Broadcom around VMware changes were significant enough that Prasanth Shenoy, VP for Cloud Platform, Infrastructure and Solutions Marketing felt the need to steady the boat. His primary argument was that everyone else was doing it. His words were “all major enterprise software providers” were employing a simple model. The old business adage “when you’re explaining, you’re losing” comes to mind. [1].

AWS Native: A Stable and Flexible Alternative

Amidst the operational shakeup caused by the Broadcom-VMware merger, AWS Native offers a stable, scalable, and cost-effective alternative. By transitioning to AWS, businesses can mitigate the risks associated with the Broadcom effect and unlock a range of benefits:

1. Predictable Pricing: AWS’s transparent and flexible pricing model allows businesses to plan their IT budgets with confidence. The pay-as-you-go model ensures that organizations only pay for the resources they use, reducing the risk of unexpected costs.

Examples

  • On-Demand Instances – These allow you to pay for compute or database capacity by the hour or second, with no long-term commitments. This model suits applications with short-term, spiky, or unpredictable workloads that cannot be interrupted.
  • Reserved Instances – You can save up to 75% over equivalent On-Demand capacity by making a one- or three-year commitment. This is ideal for steady-state or predictable usage.
  • Savings Plans – This flexible pricing model offers significant savings over On-Demand pricing, in exchange for a commitment to a consistent amount of usage (measured in $/hour) for a 1- or 3-year term.
  • Spot Instances – These allow you to take advantage of unused Amazon EC2 capacity in the AWS cloud and offer up to a 90% discount compared to O-Demand prices. Spot Instances are ideal for stateless, fault-tolerant, or flexible applications

2. Robust Support: AWS provides a comprehensive support structure with various tiers tailored to different business needs. This ensures that organizations receive the level of support required to maintain operational continuity and address issues promptly.

Examples

  • Basic Support – This includes 24/7 customer service, AWS Trusted Advisor, and access to AWS Community Forums.
  • Developer Support – Starting at $29/month, it offers best practice guidance, client-side diagnostic tools, and a full set of AWS Trusted Advisor best practice checks.
  • Business Support  – Starting at $100/month, it includes 24/7 access to Cloud Support Engineers, the full set of AWS Trusted Advisor checks, and guidance for AWS Trusted Advisor.
  • Enterprise Support – This includes all the features of Business Support plus a dedicated Technical Account Manager (TAM), Concierge Support Team, and access to Infrastructure Event Management
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3. Scalability and Flexibility: AWS’s scalable infrastructure enables businesses to adjust their resources based on demand, ensuring optimal performance without over-provisioning. This flexibility is crucial for adapting to changing business needs and market conditions.

Examples

  • Elastic Load Balancing (ELB) – This automatically distributes incoming application traffic across multiple targets, such as EC2 instances, containers, and IP addresses.
  • Auto Scaling – This helps you maintain application availability and allows you to automatically add or remove EC2 instances according to the conditions you define. You can use Auto Scaling to help ensure that you are running your desired number of Amazon EC2 instances.
  • Amazon S3 – This scalable storage service lets you store and retrieve any amount of data, at any time, from anywhere on the web. It automatically scales to accommodate your data storage needs

4. Innovation and Growth: AWS continually innovates, introducing new services and features that empower businesses to stay ahead of the competition. By leveraging AWS’s cutting-edge technologies, organizations can drive innovation and achieve their strategic goals.

Examples

  • Amazon Bedrock – A fully managed service that makes it easy for customers to build and scale generative AI applications with foundation models.
  • AWS Lambda – This lets you run code without provisioning or managing servers, scaling with the size of the workload.
  • Amazon SageMaker – This allows data scientists and developers to build, train, and deploy machine learning models quickly.

5. Security and Compliance: AWS offers a robust security framework and a wide range of compliance certifications, ensuring that businesses can meet regulatory requirements and protect their data effectively.

“Folks come to me with what they think are deep, technical CISO questions. And really what they’re asking for is, “How do I get my organization to have the impetus and the wherewithal to make a change? And I think that comes down to the investment, both literal and metaphorical, that an entity makes in making security a first-class citizen.” – Merritt Baer, Principal in the Office of the CISO at AWS

ClearScale: Your Partner in Seamless Migration

Transitioning from VMware to AWS is a strategic move that requires careful planning and execution. ClearScale, a leader in cloud migration and modernization services, provides the expertise and support needed to navigate this transition smoothly.

Comprehensive Migration Assessment

ClearScale begins the migration journey with a thorough assessment of your current VMware environment. This includes evaluating your infrastructure, applications, and workloads to develop a customized migration plan that aligns with your business objectives. The assessment identifies potential challenges and opportunities, ensuring a well-informed migration strategy [1].

Tailored Migration Solutions

VMware Exit Playbook for Seamless AWS Migration

Transitioning from VMware to AWS is a strategic move that can unlock significant benefits, but it requires careful planning and execution. This is where ClearScale comes in. As a leading expert in AWS migration and modernization services, ClearScale helps businesses navigate the complexities of migration, ensuring a smooth and successful transition.

ClearScale offers a streamlined cloud adoption solution, eliminating traditional project inefficiencies. It provides a unified procurement process and leverages funding programs like the AWS Migration Acceleration Program to expedite the journey. With a hybrid delivery model, ClearScale can integrate scalable professional and managed services at a fixed monthly cost, offering flexible, predictable pricing with tiered options to scale services with business goals.

Our methodology follows AWS best practices through five phases: Evaluate, Embark, Execute, Enhance, and Empower. This guided mix of process, programs, and ISV tools allows ClearScale to ensure a smooth transition from VMware to AWS.

Curious about AWS cloud migrations? Explore detailed case studies about how ClearScale helps companies move to the cloud seamlessly.

SA on Demand – VMware/VMC Exit (No cost and available on the AWS Marketplace)

ClearScale offers free access to AWS-certified Solutions Architects with expertise in AWS cloud design, implementation, strategy, technical know-how, and cost-benefit analysis. Having completed over 400 migrations, ClearScale provides well-defined processes, programs, and tools to support your cloud journey. Every business has unique needs, and ClearScale understands that a one-size-fits-all approach won’t suffice. We offer tailored migration solutions, whether it’s a lift-and-shift migration, re-platforming, or a complete application modernization. Our expertise ensures that your AWS environment is optimized for performance, cost-efficiency, and scalability.

VMware Exit Assessment Powered by AI (Available on the AWS Marketplace)

Evaluate moving your VMware environment to AWS with ClearScale’s VMware Exit Assessment Offer powered by AI. This initiative enables businesses to identify strategic opportunities to optimize their VMware estate, curtail unnecessary costs, optimize proprietary licensing, and adopt more efficient cloud-based solutions. Throughout this process, ClearScale leverages proprietary applications of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies at every stage of the process to enhance cost-efficiency and operational effectiveness.

  • Understand your on-premises VMware resource usage and learn strategic measures to avoid unnecessary IT expenditures in a move to AWS.
  • Discover the benefits of AWS’s flexible pricing model where you only pay for the resources they consume, optimizing both storage and compute expenses.
  • Learn how migrating to AWS can free you from stringent Broadcom and other third-party contracts and licensing agreements, helping them move towards a more scalable and flexible cloud infrastructure.

Minimizing Downtime and Disruption

One of the primary concerns during any migration is minimizing downtime and operational disruption. ClearScale employs best practices and advanced tools to ensure that the migration process is as seamless as possible. Our approach includes detailed planning, rigorous testing, and phased migration strategies to minimize impact on business operations.

Post-Migration Support and Optimization

ClearScale’s commitment to your success doesn’t end with the migration. We provide ongoing support and optimization services to ensure that your AWS environment continues to meet your evolving needs. This includes performance monitoring, cost optimization, and continuous improvement to help you get the most out of your AWS investment.

Conclusion

The Broadcom-VMware merger has introduced a level of uncertainty that businesses cannot afford to ignore. Transitioning to AWS Native provides a stable, flexible, and cost-effective alternative that shields your organization from potential operational disruptions. ClearScale, with its proven expertise in AWS migration, is the ideal partner to guide you through this transition. By leveraging ClearScale’s comprehensive migration services, businesses can ensure a seamless move to AWS, future-proof their IT infrastructure and position themselves for long-term success in an ever-evolving digital landscape.

Embrace the stability and innovation of AWS Native with ClearScale as your trusted partner. Navigate the Broadcom effect with confidence, knowing that your IT environment is in capable hands, ready to drive your business forward. Contact us today to get started.

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