Enlarge (credit: VMWare)
Chipmaker Broadcom will be acquiring VMWare for $61 billion in cash and stock, the companies announced today.
Broadcom is best known for designing and selling a wide range of chips for wired and wireless communication, including Wi-Fi and Bluetooth chips and the processors that power many routers and modems. But the company has spent billions in recent years to acquire an enterprise software portfolio—$18.9 billion for CA Technologies in 2018 and $10.7 billion for Symantec in 2019. The VMWare buy is much larger than either of those purchases, but it fits the pattern of Broadcom’s other software acquisitions.
Once the acquisition is completed, the Broadcom Software Group will adopt the VMWare name. If approved, Broadcom expects the acquisition to be complete at some point in 2023.