I'm approaching my first Broadcom license renewal, and I'm a bit anxious about making the right decision since the previous admin who handled renewals has left. We manage approximately 100 ESXi hosts distributed globally, and our company has adopted a 'Cloud First' strategy, which puts a lot of scrutiny on costs related to on-prem services. To save on renewal expenses, I'm considering switching from VMware Enterprise+ to vSphere Standard licenses. From my understanding, the main benefits of Enterprise+—like Distributed Switch support, which we don't use, and DRS—might not be necessary for us since our IT infrastructure is already overprovisioned. We have many ROBO offices; most applications have already shifted to AWS or Azure, so I believe auto-balancing isn't critical either, as a single host can handle operations there. Am I thinking too simplistically? Also, when renewing licenses, what should I lock in? How do I determine the number of CPUs to purchase when we still have upcoming hardware renewals for these offices?
1 Answer
If you've got a hundred hosts and aren’t using distributed switching, I’d find that management pretty challenging! But honestly, if your company is committed to a cloud-first approach, perhaps it's worth exploring the possibility of migrating those workflows to the cloud before focusing on license negotiations. You might save some time and effort simply by moving to AWS or Azure instead of tying yourself to VMware when the business direction pushes towards the cloud.
Exactly! Plus, Broadcom has a reputation for being a less-than-reliable supplier these days. You might be better off exploring cheaper options like Hyper-V or even Proxmox for managing your VMs.