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After being acquired by Avago, Broadcom ceased to be a single company. It’s a conglomerate of entities/BUs that are explicitly asked to NOT work cooperatively,

by TomVDB 4y ago

After being acquired by Avago, Broadcom ceased to be a single company. It’s a conglomerate of entities/BUs that are explicitly asked to NOT work cooperatively, so that each entity can be sold at moment’s notice if it doesn’t deliver the right financial results anymore. Chances are that the current leadership doesn’t care about how VMware operates, as long as it cuts enough costs to increase metrics that Wall Street considers important. Expect major cuts in R&D, receptionists, travel expenses, general benefits, and virtually no hiring of college grads or interns. You’ll be on the phone in a queue for hours to get outsourced IT support. Support of open source should be the least of your worries. Stock price might go up though…

imwillofficial 4y ago
I was part of Symantec when we were acquired. I didn’t agree with all Broadcoms moves, but they empowered us to really cut the fact and focus on what we were good at.
- axus 4y ago
  I was very surprised when the product quality went up, for the Symantec software I use.
  - phpisthebest 4y ago
    To be fair, prior to broadcom purchase symantec was not known fo high product quality In the sysadmin world, Backup Exec and Norton products are meme's at this point, examples of the worst kind of software so I am not sure how it could have gone down in quality
    - imwillofficial 4y ago
      The consumer grade Symantec software and enterprise Symantec software were always different. Norton never had any real bearing on SEP. The consumer side of Symantec was not sold to Broadcom and became Norton Lifelock.
- LeifCarrotson 4y ago
  Cut the fat, I think you mean. Not sure if that was a typo, eggcorn, or pun on truth and fiction post-acquisition...
  - imwillofficial 4y ago
    Thank you, I did indeed mean cut the fat. I need to cut the fat on my fat fingers!
Thoreandan 4y ago
Thanks for the clarification - it's the corporate-shoggoth of HP>Agilent>Infineon+LSI>Avago "Broadcom Inc." not underground-dungeon-scandal "Broadcom Corporation". Their NASDAQ ticker is still AVGO. :)
- nereye 4y ago
  Broadcom Inc. bought Broadcom Corp. in 2015 (and presumable got its name from it).
- rsync 4y ago
  … and here all I wanted was updates to fusion and decent HBAs…
- duskwuff 4y ago
  > not underground-dungeon-scandal "Broadcom Corporation" TIL: https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2008/11/nicholas200811 https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2008/11/nicholas200811
mathattack 4y ago
Consistent with my experience as a customer of other Broadcom purchases.
SulphurSmell 4y ago
This is exactly correct. Hock (love him or hate him) knows exactly what he is doing, and is entirely unapologetic. He looks only at margin. You have $10B revenue stream at 2% profit margin? Hock will happily cut that in half for a 10% margin he can depend on. It's all about ARR. Great for shareholders and those with a mountain of RSU's... but not so great for employees. Was at CA...saw it happen.
- qeternity 4y ago
  > It's all about ARR. You argued the exact opposite? You're saying it's all about EBITDA...
  - SulphurSmell 4y ago
    I don't think so. Certainly, EBITDA is part of any story. What I was trying to convey was that Broadcom very much wants their customers to be engaged in a strong subscription model... big, recurring license agreements. Customers who, year after year, can be relied upon to send Broadcom money...even if they buy nothing new. Broadcom likes those Big Companies who can be counted upon to spend a consistent (but never shrinking) amount every year. Hock is ruthless in this...and has a pretty good bullshit detector... again, he probably makes a lot of people uncomfortable. Nothing wrong with that approach... it's very pragmatic... especially for shareholders. Broadcom might give you more for your money every year, but you will never spend less of it.
mushbino 4y ago
It's amazing our system rewards all of those things. Cutting r&d, cutting jobs, cutting downstream contractors, using profit for stock buybacks, etc
- mindslight 4y ago
  Optimizing for efficiency isn't a bad thing. The real problem is the larger economic feedback loop based around keeping the number of hours worked the same. So the efficiency gains are effectively lost, and the average worker is left still depending on the ever-optimized structure rather than being able to accumulate enough wealth to escape it and create new structures.

by TomVDB 4y ago

imwillofficial 4y ago

I was part of Symantec when we were acquired. I didn’t agree with all Broadcoms moves, but they empowered us to really cut the fact and focus on what we were good at.

axus 4y ago
I was very surprised when the product quality went up, for the Symantec software I use.
- phpisthebest 4y ago
  To be fair, prior to broadcom purchase symantec was not known fo high product quality In the sysadmin world, Backup Exec and Norton products are meme's at this point, examples of the worst kind of software so I am not sure how it could have gone down in quality
  - imwillofficial 4y ago
    The consumer grade Symantec software and enterprise Symantec software were always different. Norton never had any real bearing on SEP. The consumer side of Symantec was not sold to Broadcom and became Norton Lifelock.
LeifCarrotson 4y ago
Cut the fat, I think you mean. Not sure if that was a typo, eggcorn, or pun on truth and fiction post-acquisition...
- imwillofficial 4y ago
  Thank you, I did indeed mean cut the fat. I need to cut the fat on my fat fingers!

Thoreandan 4y ago

Thanks for the clarification - it's the corporate-shoggoth of HP>Agilent>Infineon+LSI>Avago "Broadcom Inc." not underground-dungeon-scandal "Broadcom Corporation". Their NASDAQ ticker is still AVGO. :)

nereye 4y ago
Broadcom Inc. bought Broadcom Corp. in 2015 (and presumable got its name from it).
rsync 4y ago
… and here all I wanted was updates to fusion and decent HBAs…
duskwuff 4y ago
> not underground-dungeon-scandal "Broadcom Corporation" TIL: https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2008/11/nicholas200811 https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2008/11/nicholas200811

mathattack 4y ago

Consistent with my experience as a customer of other Broadcom purchases.

SulphurSmell 4y ago

This is exactly correct. Hock (love him or hate him) knows exactly what he is doing, and is entirely unapologetic. He looks only at margin. You have $10B revenue stream at 2% profit margin? Hock will happily cut that in half for a 10% margin he can depend on. It's all about ARR. Great for shareholders and those with a mountain of RSU's... but not so great for employees. Was at CA...saw it happen.

qeternity 4y ago
> It's all about ARR. You argued the exact opposite? You're saying it's all about EBITDA...
- SulphurSmell 4y ago
  I don't think so. Certainly, EBITDA is part of any story. What I was trying to convey was that Broadcom very much wants their customers to be engaged in a strong subscription model... big, recurring license agreements. Customers who, year after year, can be relied upon to send Broadcom money...even if they buy nothing new. Broadcom likes those Big Companies who can be counted upon to spend a consistent (but never shrinking) amount every year. Hock is ruthless in this...and has a pretty good bullshit detector... again, he probably makes a lot of people uncomfortable. Nothing wrong with that approach... it's very pragmatic... especially for shareholders. Broadcom might give you more for your money every year, but you will never spend less of it.

mushbino 4y ago

It's amazing our system rewards all of those things. Cutting r&d, cutting jobs, cutting downstream contractors, using profit for stock buybacks, etc

mindslight 4y ago
Optimizing for efficiency isn't a bad thing. The real problem is the larger economic feedback loop based around keeping the number of hours worked the same. So the efficiency gains are effectively lost, and the average worker is left still depending on the ever-optimized structure rather than being able to accumulate enough wealth to escape it and create new structures.