Microsoft Stops Selling VMware Licenses on Azure, Because Apparently Hell Needed More Paperwork

Right, here’s the short version before management turns this into a fourteen-slide PowerPoint full of clip art and bad decisions: Microsoft has stopped selling VMware Cloud Foundation licenses through Azure. In other words, if you were hoping to buy the VMware bits directly from Microsoft’s cloud marketplace like a lazy bastard clicking “Add to cart,” that party’s over.

The article explains that this change is tied to the ongoing licensing and business chaos that followed Broadcom’s takeover of VMware. And because no corporate acquisition is complete without setting fire to customer goodwill, Broadcom has been “simplifying” VMware’s offerings the way a chainsaw “simplifies” a tree. Products, bundles, licensing, partner channels—everything’s been shoved around until nobody knows what the hell they’re paying for anymore.

What Microsoft is doing now is stepping back from reselling those VMware licenses on Azure. Azure VMware Solution itself still exists, so this is not Microsoft marching into the server room and unplugging the bastard. But customers now have to deal with licensing in a different way, which is corporate speak for: “Congratulations, your procurement process just became even more annoying.”

The key point, for anyone too sleep-deprived to read vendor statements, is that Microsoft isn’t killing VMware workloads on Azure. The service remains, but the license resale model is what’s been yanked. So no, the sky isn’t falling—just your nice convenient purchasing path. Instead of a straightforward transaction, customers may now need to work directly through Broadcom or approved partners, which is exactly the sort of bureaucratic shitshow that makes sysadmins age in dog years.

The article also points out the wider mess: Broadcom’s VMware changes have already caused plenty of uncertainty across the industry. Subscription-only licensing, SKU reshuffles, partner changes, and customers being nudged—fine, shoved—toward more expensive bundles. Microsoft dropping out of the license-selling business on Azure fits neatly into that same steaming pile of enterprise nonsense.

So the practical summary is this: if your organization runs or plans to run VMware on Azure, don’t assume you can buy everything the same way you used to. Check the new licensing path, talk to your reseller, brace for confusing invoices, and prepare for one of those meetings where six people pretend they understand the new model while one poor sysadmin quietly Googles the truth under the table.

In short: Azure VMware Solution still lives, Microsoft just doesn’t want to be the one flogging the licenses anymore. Broadcom’s licensing circus continues, and customers get the usual reward for their loyalty: more complexity, less clarity, and a fresh bucket of administrative crap to mop up.

This reminds me of a place where management “simplified” software procurement by adding three new approval layers, two vendors, and one compliance goblin who rejected orders because the font looked suspicious. Took six weeks to buy a damn monitoring tool, but they called it efficiency. Bastards.

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https://4sysops.com/archives/microsoft-stops-selling-vmware-licenses-on-azure/