Why a quarter of VMware customers are choosing to go unsupported 

Shane O’Rourke, Senior Director, Global VMware Support Services  

Twelve months ago, when Spinnaker launched its global VMware support practice, I joined the team after a decade in technical support management in VMware. I thought I’d seen it all: escalations, upgrades, migration dramas. And I’d spoken to dozens of customers in the run-up to Broadcom’s acquisition, many already anxious about licensing, costs, and whether they’d still be able to trust the vendor behind their infrastructure. 

If you’d told me a year ago that, today, that around a quarter of the VMware customers spoken with have either chosen to go unsupported or are seriously considering doing so, I would have thought you were exaggerating. But that’s what I’ve witnessed first-hand. 

Why are VMware customers going unsupported?  

Trust

Most often, it comes down to trust (or the lack thereof). Since the Broadcom acquisition, ambiguity is the only thing we’ve been able to count on. Customers distrust the licensing changes, many outright reject the move to a subscription model, and most simply want to avoid getting caught in another round of sudden price hikes, changing terms, or forced upgrades driven by the vendor.  

What ‘unsupported’ actually means

VMware has unwittingly pushed many customers into running their environments unsupported. The decision to shed your support contract isn’t something anyone is doing without serious consideration, and many customers feel like they have no alternative in the face of the VMware changes. 

The limits of patching

Years inside VMware taught me that the industry treats patching as the universal answer to risk. Over the last year, it’s become clear that many organizations don’t patch as consistently as they think, or as regularly as they should. A better approach, and one I’ve seen proven over the last year, starts with how the platform is used in your environment, not just what’s in the release notes. This is standard operating procedure in third-party software support, and it makes all the difference, especially where automation, integration, or years of customization have introduced layers of complexity.  

End of support for vSphere 7.0 looms

This October, vSphere 7.0 will go end-of-support. Many of the customers I talk to are still running on version 7, often because it’s “just working” and nobody wants to fix what isn’t broken. But as support winds down, the risks for these customers only compound: no more CVEs, no more zero-day patches, and no guarantees if something fundamental fails. From my perspective, now is the time to step back and look at what’s actually right for your business, your use cases, and your environment, not just what the vendor lifecycle dictates. There are alternatives, and going unsupported shouldn’t be the default.  

The universality of risk

The biggest surprise for me in the last twelve months isn’t just the number of unsupported customers, but how universal this risk-taking has become. The tolerance for risk has gone through the roof at many enterprises, for the sole reason that decision makers feel like they’ve been backed into a corner. But you’re not. Our team is now built around the reality that customers need flexible, long-term support. We don’t ask them to surrender their perpetual licenses or push them down one migration path.   

A year into Spinnaker’s VMware support offering—and a year into my own role here—the picture for VMware’s customers feels even more uncertain than ever. Every week, I talk to organizations who are running unsupported, and even more decision makers are now weighing up their options as vSphere 7 support ends.  

My advice is simple: take a step back before you decide to go it alone. Running unsupported isn’t a long-term plan, it’s usually just a (understandable but flawed) reaction to all the changes and confusion in the industry right now. 

You don’t have to go it alone. Let’s explore what support could look like for your VMware environment. Start the Conversation.