SHEETZ, the US convenience store chain, is bidding farewell to VMware as it migrates its 838 locations off the platform. The move comes after Sheetz decided that Broadcom’s changes, including a shift towards subscription models and away from perpetual licenses, created too much uncertainty for long-term budgeting.

Scott Robertson, infrastructure team manager at Sheetz, told Ars Technica that moving to StorMagic’s SvHCI will save the company money in the long run. This migration involves transferring 12 to 14 VMs per store, with an additional two VMs being replaced over the coming months as Windows 10 is updated to Windows 11.

So far, more than 600 stores have been migrated, with the entire project expected to be completed in four months. Gary Sliver, director of platform engineering at Sheetz, highlighted that StorMagic’s SvSAN, which has already been used for critical applications since 2019, was key to proving its capabilities.

Despite the challenges inherent in such a large IT project, Robertson noted that migrating won’t require sending technicians to every site. Instead, the transition can be managed remotely and without hardware upgrades, saving Sheetz significant costs.