Broadcom’s recently closed acquisition of VMware is likely to have its share of surprises for users and ecosystem partners – some more expected than others.

Before the deal’s close, customers were concerned about future pricing, product plans, sales coverage and support. In the first quarter since, Broadcom has already started laying off VMware employees, changing how products are bundled and canceling channel contracts.

VMware rival and hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) provider Nutanix – which has previously shared its intent to capitalize on Broadcom’s acquisition of VMware – claims VMware customers are turning to Nutanix for advice on “minimizing their exposure to these Broadcom changes,” Nutanix SVP of Product and Solutions Marketing Lee Caswell wrote in a blog post.

As Broadcom hastens to make changes consistent with its plan to almost double VMware’s profitability in the next three years, customers might be surprised by higher bills, longer storage payback periods, and reduced channel partner and hardware vendor investments.

Caswell expects the majority of VMware customers will end up paying more money for the same services now that the acquisition has closed.

“Despite Broadcom statements that it would not focus on raising prices, we believe new bundling strategies will drive up effective prices for most customers,” he said.

Take vSphere Enterprise+, for example. This product is now available only  in a bundle with vSAN and vRealize licenses, meaning vSphere customers (especially those who aren’t operating HCI) could see their costs double or triple as a result.

In addition, storage payback periods for legacy tech like SAN and NAS will lengthen because of the acquisition, Caswell said. Investments in traditional storage technologies can typically be justified by the consolidation benefits of migrating from physical to virtual servers, paired with the cost of a hypervisor.

But as vSphere costs are set to rise, VMware customers not looking to be surprised should ask their storage hardware vendors for updated TCO and ROI models that reflect vSphere changes, Caswell said.

This bundling change could also slow data processing unit (DPU) adoption. “Customer plans to support SmartNICs and DPUs from Nvidia, Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) and Intel may slow down if the vSphere Enterprise+ bundling strategy and higher effective cost is extended to the more complicated DPU environment,” Caswell said.

A major part of Broadcom’s public plan for VMware is changing its top 2,000 customers by revenue to a direct sales strategy, eliminating third-party resellers and the slice of cash they take for distributing VMware services.

Based on VMware’s recent height of 65,000 active reseller partners and 4,500 active cloud and managed service providers, Broadcom’s plan will do away with an estimated $650 million in channel margins and spark a decline in the availability of channel-delivered VMware installation and support resources.

As a result, Caswell anticipates those channel partners will reduce the amount of money they invest in VMware.

Major hardware vendors and long-time VMware partners Dell Technologies, HPE and Lenovo might similarly reduce their investments in VMware – and their level of association with the company, according to Caswell.

Given that joint deals are typically fulfilled by channel partners, who then make money based on the aggregate solution value, hardware system vendors will “risk alienating their channel partners by promoting VMware offerings,” he said. Dell, HPE and Lenovo “may look for more channel-friendly alternatives” to Broadcom VMware.

Specifically, Caswell predicts Dell will shift its VxRail HCI platform’s storage to its own ScaleIO virtual storage instead of VMware vSAN – even though ScaleIO is less suitable for HCI than vSAN. “With Broadcom going direct, sales of VxRail would likely require joint selling and shared account control between Dell and Broadcom. Consequently, Dell may attempt to substitute ScaleIO in place of vSAN,” he said.