Broadcom's VMware lockdown accelerates Proxmox migration

Broadcom pulled VDDK downloads, making it harder to leave VMware. The HN thread was not sympathetic to Broadcom. The dominant reaction was that most companies could have been running Proxmox all along and avoided the licensing nightmare entirely. The fact that VMware-to-Proxmox migrations are explicitly not affected by the VDDK restriction was treated as both a relief and a joke.

This is part of a broader pattern this year of legacy infrastructure vendors tightening screws post-acquisition: higher prices, restricted tooling, fewer exit ramps. Broadcom buying VMware was always going to end here. The HN crowd was largely unsurprised.

The practical counterpoint: enterprise at scale has real migration costs, and 'just use Proxmox' glosses over integration depth with existing tooling, support contracts, and the organizational inertia of large IT shops. But for anyone not yet locked in, the decision calculus is increasingly obvious.