BROADCOM will release an updated vSphere Standard virtualization platform this October, reversing a three-year period during which the company prioritized its pricier VMware Cloud Foundation bundle and effectively abandoned the lower-end product line.
The move amounts to a strategic reversal. When Broadcom acquired VMware, it replaced perpetual licenses with subscription-based bundles, with VCF as the flagship offering. SMBs balked at both the cost and feature bloat. According to customers, VMware sales representatives pushed VCF aggressively and, in some cases, told prospects that vSphere Standard was unavailable.
Paul Turner, VCF's chief product officer, conceded the problem to The Register: "We had too big a focus on VCF." He attributed the vSphere Standard neglect to security improvements needed in VCF 9, which shipped in 2025. Ram Velaga, president of Broadcom's Infrastructure Software Group, defended the strategy differently—claiming that an early vSphere Standard update would have "distracted" customers from private cloud adoption.
Both explanations underscore a deliberate product strategy, not an oversight. Broadcom's sales incentive structure explicitly rewarded VCF deals, Turner confirmed.
The cost: three years of customer attrition. Dean Colpitts, CTO of Canadian managed services provider Members IT Group, said his company exited the VMware business entirely after Broadcom severed their 19-year partnership. "Broadcom has burned all the bridges," Colpitts told Ars Technica.
Online discussions mirror that sentiment. Reddit users and forum participants describe the vSphere Standard revival as "too little, too late." Sumit Bhatia, co-author of a report on VMware's transition under Broadcom, noted that "three years of neglect, quote refusals, and VCF-only sales tactics have already pushed many SMBs toward Nutanix, Proxmox, and Hyper-V." He added: "Trust, not features, is the real deficit."
Broadcom faces a credibility gap that a product release alone will not close. The company must demonstrate not just a competitive feature set but a fundamental change in sales discipline and partner treatment.
