Leaving VMware is not free, but the exit bill is a one-off and much of it buys assets you keep. The calculator below models the three real costs of moving — capex, target licensing and migration services — against the Broadcom subscription you stop paying, and returns a payback period in GBP for your own estate.
| VMs | Hosts | VMware VCF / yr | Proxmox VE / yr | 3-yr saving |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 50 | 3× | £50,304 | £2,820 | £142,452 |
| 100 | 4× | £67,072 | £3,760 | £189,936 |
| 250 | 8× | £134,144 | £7,520 | £379,872 |
| 500 | 15× | £251,520 | £14,100 | £712,260 |
All figures are indicative estimates for planning only and subject to change; licence prices vary by reseller and deal size, and any monthly finance figure is subject to credit approval — not a quotation.
The three costs of leaving — and why only one recurs
An exit has three parts. New hosts are capital expenditure you own outright and depreciate over years, not rent that never ends. The target platform — Proxmox, Hyper-V, Nutanix or similar — carries its own licence, often far lighter than VCF or free at the hypervisor layer. Migration services are a single, bounded project fee. Only the Broadcom subscription is perpetual, which is precisely why replacing it changes the arithmetic so sharply.
Why the sums favour a move, especially at smaller scale
Broadcom's per-core model and the 16-core-per-CPU and 72-core-per-order minimums fall hardest on compact UK estates, inflating renewals well beyond the compute actually used. Because that spend now recurs every year with no end and no asset, even a substantial one-off exit is quickly overtaken. The calculator weighs your total leaving cost against the annual saving to show where the lines cross — typically inside a single renewal cycle.
Capex you own versus subscription you rent
The most misread line is the hardware. Fresh hosts are not a sunk migration cost; they are infrastructure that outlives the project, carries residual value and sits on your balance sheet as an asset. Denser modern servers often consolidate the estate, trimming the licence footprint on the new platform too. Set an owned, depreciating capital purchase against an open-ended Broadcom bill and the case for a controlled exit becomes a finance decision, not just a technical one.
FAQs
Isn't buying new hardware just a sunk migration cost?
No. New hosts are a capital asset you own, depreciate over several years and can eventually resell — unlike a VMware subscription, which is pure recurring rent with nothing to show at the end. The calculator treats capex as a one-off purchase, not an ongoing charge, which is why the payback still lands quickly even after buying kit.
How is the payback period actually worked out?
It divides your total one-off exit cost — new hardware capex, the target-platform licence and migration services — by the annual saving from stopping your Broadcom subscription. The result is the number of months or years until the move pays for itself. Enter your own host count and licensing to see a figure specific to your estate in GBP.
Does a smaller VMware estate change the case for leaving?
Often it strengthens it. Broadcom's per-core minimums mean small and mid-size UK deployments frequently pay for far more capacity than they run, so the recurring saving is disproportionately large relative to a modest exit project. Smaller estates also migrate faster and need fewer new hosts, shortening both the timeline and the payback.