Bureau of Meteorology's VMware bill more than doubles

The Bureau of Meteorology’s VMware licensing bill for the next three years has more than doubled to $12.2 million, the latest example of a federal government entity to face soaring costs for the virtualisation software.

The weather bureau wrapped up a previous three-year deal for VMware licensing at the end of last year, sourced via Kirra Services and worth a bit under $4.9 million.

The new licensing arrangement is with VMware directly, and comes at a significant premium of $12.2 million, representing a 149 percent increase.

In response to questions from iTnews, a spokesperson said that the bureau's VMware needs and consumption patterns were largely unchanged between the previous licensing agreement and the new one.

“The bureau’s core requirements for VMware services remained largely consistent with the previous agreement,” the spokesperson told iTnews.

“The cost increase reflects changes to the vendor’s commercial and licensing model rather than a material increase in the bureau’s consumption of services.”

VMware customers have been put on notice over price increases since the vendor’s acquisition by Broadcom and a decision to discontinue perpetual licenses in favour of a subscription services model.

Since then, some Australian VMware customers have evaluated hypervisor alternatives, although there has been some reluctance to publicise making such a switch.

For some customers, however, VMware is particularly entrenched in their infrastructure environments, making any migration away from it complex and potentially unachievable before their licensing renewal comes due.

The Bureau of Meteorology is the second large federal government entity to see their VMware bill skyrocket in the past month.

iTnews was first to report Defence’s recent licensing hike, from $82 million to $178 million.

Defence indicated that it had sought to optimise its consumption and use of VMware prior to the licensing renewal, to keep costs down.