Broadcom’s proposed acquisition of VMware is a bombastic move by the chip giant that, if approved, will cause nothing but chaos for both parties. Not surprisingly, it has received a less-than-stellar reaction from many industry observers, but I am here to tell you they are wrong.

Those observers rightly point out that Broadcom has a poor history of integrating acquisitions that sit just outside of its chip lane. This includes the oft-cited CA Technologies and Symantec deals that we can only politely say … happened.

There is also the notion that a big chip company focused so precisely on margins in a commoditized market will stifle any form of capital-intensive innovation VMware will need to pursue its valuation. And this is also likely true.

But I am here to tell you that despite these facts, I love this deal for all the reasons. This deal must go through, and we must all hope the world’s supply of popcorn can keep up.

Broadcom is indeed great at what it does. It makes awesome chips that are vital to powering servers that power the world’s clouds. It also has software-focused offshoots in the management and security space that have helped modernize that chip business.

And, by adding VMware’s software and cloud expertise to oversee that software business, Broadcom can further build out its software operations to further extend its reach up the stack.

Let chaos reign!

However, none of that logic matters. This deal must go through because it’s going to be fun to watch the chaos that will result.

I am not sure if I have mentioned this before, but I love chaos. Especially when it involves multi-billion-dollar companies that are generally too conservative to take real chances. And this is that sort of deal.

Can Broadcom smoothly integrate VMware in a way that somehow makes everyone a winner? Sure, anything is possible.

But, Broadcom has more often shown that its integration skills leave a lot to be desired, and at least one other party is unhappy with the results.

This deal will obviously be compared to IBM’s $34 billion acquisition of Red Hat, which was braced against similar integration concerns, but has seemingly gone well. Red Hat continues to be a leading force in the open source and cloud native ecosystem, while IBM has shed many of its legacy hardware operations in order to lean into Red Hat’s software advances.

Was it worth $34 billion? It was to me in terms of the entertainment value in watching how the deal upended the market.

At the other extreme, Broadcom’s deal might also be compared to AT&T’s $85 billion purchase of Time Warner, and to a lesser extent, its $67 billion purchase of DirecTV. Those deals saddled the telecom giant with a tremendous amount of debt, showed that telecom folks are not the most creative, and were both eventually unwound at the cost of billions of dollars.

Again, tons of entertainment.

Minimizing collateral damage

I honestly don’t care which way this Broadcom deal goes, as either route will be fun to watch.

Of course, the biggest downside to this chaotic deal will be the collateral damage. Acquisitions nearly always result in job cuts, whether they go smoothly or not. And this deal, if approved, will be no different.

One good angle on this is that there is not a ton of overlap between Broadcom and VMware. Sure, there is some on the software management and security side, and there would be some consolidation of more general human resource and marketing departments, but save for those directly impacted, it’s not significant.

The bigger impact could come from the brain trust at VMware that might see a new ownership structure and look outside of the company for a new alternative.

VMware has been aggressive in the past few years – under the muddled ownership structure of Dell Technologies – in acquiring and integrating top-down cloud native organizations that have brought top-level talent into the company. If Broadcom comes in and wants an immediate return on that nearly $70 billion investment, those folks might head for the door, to the detriment of VMware and Broadcom and to the benefit of rivals.

Again, I give two big thumbs up to this deal, but it’s mostly for all the wrong reasons. Now excuse me as I stock up on popcorn.