atelier d'auteur · bruxelles · mmxxvi
Dt fig. I no. 01 - department title brussels · mmxxvi

Département des Harnais

author's workshop · ai agent harnesses
section of the Files · the model kept on a leash, the proof required
Decision sheet material frozen on 9 September 2026 · next revision scheduled for 1 December 2026

After VMware, for French-speaking SMEs and mid-caps

What the material teaches an SME or a mid-cap whose renewal falls within eighteen months

This sheet is addressed to a French-speaking SME or mid-cap whose VMware renewal falls within eighteen months, to its IT department and to the provider supporting it. Three lessons: the price is no longer public, the quote is the first document to obtain; the ARM option does not exist for purchase, and waiting costs the price of the renewal every quarter; the decision rests on the farm's dependency profile and on the contractual calendar, not on the brand. The sheet rules between options A, B and C on twenty-six named and dated sources [1]–[26].

The decision reached

The arbitration lies between option A (staying under Broadcom, discounted three-year commitment) and option C (structured migration to Proxmox VE / XCP-ng). The ARM option is closed: VKS not in production, no GA date [2] [7] [8], and “waiting for ARM” costs the price of option A every quarter. The choice depends on the dependency profile of the virtual farm and on the buyer's contractual calendar.

OptionVerdictSummary
A — Stay under Broadcom Retained if structuring dependencies Subscription per physical core, floor of 16 cores per CPU [3], November 2024 list price, the only public reference, sale by quote since [4]. Discounts on a three-year commitment documented [5]. No grace period; late penalty reported by a single source [6].
B — Switch VCF to ARM Closed — monitoring only VKS not in production, no GA date, ESX not ported to ARM [8] [9]. The licence remains identical to option A. No ARM product available for purchase in September 2026.
C — Migrate to open source (Proxmox VE / XCP-ng) Retained if simple reference profile Proxmox VE: subscription per socket, features included at every tier [10]. Vates/XCP-ng: subscription per host [11]. Migration of 18 to 48 months according to Gartner, cost per VM quantified in the dossier [14].

Decision criteria

  1. Licence TCO — projected over the commitment period and beyond.
  2. Migration costs and duration — including business interruptions and backup revalidation.
  3. Reversibility — cost of the exit option for each scenario.
  4. In-house skills — available or to be acquired to operate the target platform.
  5. Structuring dependencies — vSAN, NSX, DRS, VDI, backup.

Recommendations

  • Simple reference profile (no vSAN, NSX, DRS, VDI, encrypted VMs or vTPM) → structured migration to Proxmox VE or XCP-ng [10] [11]. Over five years, the software line is 6.5 to 15 times below option A at list price [14].
  • Profile with structuring dependencies → stay under Broadcom with a discounted three-year commitment [3] [5]. These building blocks constitute the lock-in; Gartner sees no strictly equivalent replacement for the VMware hypervisor [14].
  • ARM option → monitoring only [8] [9]. “Waiting for ARM” costs the price of option A from today [2] [7].
  • Before signing (option A): check the renewal dates, the exit clauses, the cores disabled in the BIOS, and the audits reported since June 2025 [6].
  • Before migrating (option C): inventory the exclusions (vSAN, encrypted VMs, vTPM) [12], calibrate the calendar on the warm migration mechanics (Xen Orchestra 5.109, July 2025) [19], and budget for the hidden costs (requalification of procedures, training, rewriting of automations) [17].

Method

A decision reached — A or C depending on the profile —, three options reviewed, five criteria, and a position argued from the exhibits filed. Never universal advice.

What the full dossier adds

The full dossier is written for an SME or a mid-cap whose renewal is approaching. It adds the detailed argument, the amounts from the November 2024 pricebook with their vintage, the list of migration exclusions, the clauses to read before signing, and the source-by-source analysis. This page carries only the verdict and an overview.

Sources

  1. [1] informatiquenews.fr, article 113439, op-ed by Samuel Pollet (NXO) — informatiquenews.fr. 09/09/2026
  2. [2] LeMagIT, interview with Dilpreet Bindra (Broadcom) — lemagit.fr. 07/09/2026
  3. [3] Broadcom KB 313548 — floor of 16 cores per CPU. knowledge.broadcom.com. Page not dated.
  4. [4] Pricebook Broadcom novembre 2024 — reaffirmed at VCF 9.0 GA.
  5. [5] ECCO/CISPE — complaint to the European Commission, 30-50 % discounts. cispe.cloud and appendix (PDF). 19/03/2026
  6. [6] Single practitioner testimony — +20 % penalty, audits since June 2025.
  7. [7] Broadcom VCF 9.1 — GA announced on 5 May 2026. broadcom.com ; release notes dated 12 May 2026. 05/05/2026
  8. [8] The Register — ESXi-Arm preview. theregister.com. 19/05/2026
  9. [9] itdaily, “Broadcom to Convert VMware Cloud Foundation to ARM” — a gradual port of VCF to ARM announced with no timetable, formal support for ESXi on ARM still to come; the “niche product” in the article refers to vSphere DSE, not to the ARM offering. itdaily.com. 27/08/2025
  10. [10] Proxmox VE — per-socket price list. proxmox.com. Page not dated.
  11. [11] Vates/XCP-ng — publisher pricing, vates.tech ; LTS until 30 November 2028, docs.xcp-ng.org. 18/08/2026
  12. [12] Proxmox Wiki — import exclusions (vSAN, vTPM, encrypted VMs). pve.proxmox.com. Status “November 2024” according to the page.
  13. [13] PVE release notes — ESXi import wizard (8.2, 24/04/2024), Dynamic Load Balancer (9.2, 21/05/2026). pve.proxmox.com. 07/09/2026
  14. [14] Gartner — 18-48 months, cost per VM quantified in the dossier, ~35 % of workloads off VMware by 2028.
  15. [15] Forrester (Naveen Chhabra, Network World) — ~20 % of migrations. networkworld.com. 22/01/2024
  16. [16] Enix — integrator field report (single source). enix.io. 01/10/2024
  17. [17] OLHYN — migration costs. olhyn.fr. 27/06/2026
  18. [18] Cloud-PVE — year-one ROI (integrator with a commercial interest). cloud-pve.com. Page not dated.
  19. [19] Xen Orchestra 5.109 — warm migration. xen-orchestra.com. 31/07/2025
  20. [20] Xen Orchestra — VMFS 6 import, machines must be powered off. docs.xcp-ng.org. 15/08/2026
  21. [21] It's FOSS — withdrawal of the public VDDK. itsfoss.com. 09/09/2026
  22. [22] Ars Technica — Tesco case (40,000 workloads, +175 %). arstechnica.com. 17/06/2026
  23. [23] IT-Connect / Soeldner Consult / securityonline.info — floor of 72 cores, withdrawn. it-connect.fr (28/03/2025), soeldner-consult.de (10/04/2025), securityonline.info (21/04/2025).
  24. [24] AT&T v. Broadcom — email produced in court, +1,050 % increase. arstechnica.com, with the affidavit attached. 01/10/2024
  25. [25] ChannelNews, « Orange aussi affronte VMware-Broadcom devant les tribunaux » — Orange is suing VMware in interim proceedings for abrupt termination of the commercial relationship; the extension of a global ELA obtained in July 2024 before the Paris commercial court concerns Thales, not Orange. channelnews.fr. 19/09/2024
  26. [26] Redress Compliance — self-report, ~25 % below the opening. redresscompliance.com. 20/05/2024