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IBM to buy HashiCorp in $6.4B deal

reuters.com

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Re: IBM to buy HashiCorp in $6.4B deal

#111

Post by paulddraper »

rank0 wrote: post #94
calgoo wrote: post #49

Well, it was nice while it lasted! HashiCorp always felt like a company made by actual engineers, not "bean counters". Now it will just be another cog in the IBM machine, slowly grinding it down, removing everything attractive, just like RedHat and CentOS. Hopefully this will create a new wave off innovation, and someone will create something to replace the monopoly on IaC that IBM now owns.

I don’t understand people’s beef with IBM. They have been responsible for incredible R&D within computing. I even LIKE redhat/fedora! HashiCorp had already been sold out since waaaay before this acquisition and I also don’t understand why their engineers are seen as “special”…

Watson

Re: IBM to buy HashiCorp in $6.4B deal

#112

Post by altairprime »

rank0 wrote: post #94
calgoo wrote: post #49

Well, it was nice while it lasted! HashiCorp always felt like a company made by actual engineers, not "bean counters". Now it will just be another cog in the IBM machine, slowly grinding it down, removing everything attractive, just like RedHat and CentOS. Hopefully this will create a new wave off innovation, and someone will create something to replace the monopoly on IaC that IBM now owns.

I don’t understand people’s beef with IBM. They have been responsible for incredible R&D within computing. I even LIKE redhat/fedora! HashiCorp had already been sold out since waaaay before this acquisition and I also don’t understand why their engineers are seen as “special”…

IBM took away the ability of CentOS to be a free and trivial to swap-in alternative to the paid product RedHat Enterprise. That RedHat was already in financial trouble due to self-cannibalizing their own paid product is irrelevant; emotionally, “IBM” – not “RedHat” – made the decision to stop charging $0 for their custom enterprise patchsets and release trains, and so IBM will always be the focus of community ire about RedHat’s acquisition.

I expect, like RedHat, that the Hashicorp acquisition will result in a lot of startups that do not need enterprise-grade products shifting away from “anything Hashicorp offers that needs to charge money for Hashicorp to stay revenue-positive” and towards “any and all free alternatives that lower the opex of a business”, along with derogatory comments about IBM predictably assigning a non-$0 price for Hashicorp’s future work output.

Re: IBM to buy HashiCorp in $6.4B deal

#113

Post by angulardragon03 »

indigodaddy wrote: post #103
cdchn wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Soon to be built into Ansible Automation Platform. Should only cost $100 per managed resource.

Is the implication that we won’t be able to freely use ansible-playbook anymore, and/or development will end on the “freely” available one?

No, the implication is that Terraform will become prohibitively expensive to use. AAP has been around for a while, as Red Hat’s downstream of (iirc) AWX. It’s also quite pricey, like Terraform may become.

Re: IBM to buy HashiCorp in $6.4B deal

#116

Post by mywittyname »

czbond wrote: post #45
onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IBM had ~$14B cash to start the year. Additionally, you don't need the full purchase price in cash to buy the company. You can do leveraged buyouts, etc.

IBM M&A person: "We'd like to buy you in all IBM stock! " Hopefully someone at HashiCorp: "Hell no, cash please"

Press release says it's all cash at $35/sh using cash-on-hand for the purchase.

Re: IBM to buy HashiCorp in $6.4B deal

#117

Post by DerpHerpington »

aodin wrote: post #100
liveoneggs wrote: post #72

Although I think they have very different use cases this means IBM own both Ansible and Terraform, both claiming to be IaC

Although there is significant overlap between the two, I prefer Terraform for resource provisioning and Ansible for resource configuration.

Same, but now IBM will be able to merge them to create Terrible (or Ansiform). ;)

Re: IBM to buy HashiCorp in $6.4B deal

#118

Post by cedws »

calgoo wrote: post #49

Well, it was nice while it lasted! HashiCorp always felt like a company made by actual engineers, not "bean counters". Now it will just be another cog in the IBM machine, slowly grinding it down, removing everything attractive, just like RedHat and CentOS. Hopefully this will create a new wave off innovation, and someone will create something to replace the monopoly on IaC that IBM now owns.

I see this as an opportunity. Not to replace HashiCorp's products - OpenTofu and OpenBao are snapping up most of the mindshare for now - but to build another OSS-first developer darling company.

Re: IBM to buy HashiCorp in $6.4B deal

#119

Post by bigstrat2003 »

paxys wrote: post #95
foxandmouse wrote: post #79

I expected this when the terraform license changed. Not IBM specifically but it was obvious they weren't interested/ able to continue with their founding vision.

Hashicorp had a $14 billion IPO in Dec 2021 and was trading at ~$4.7 billion right before the acquisition announcement. At that point it doesn't matter what the company or its founders want or what their long term vision is. Shareholders are in charge and heads are going to roll if the price doesn't get back up quick by any means necessary.

Yet another example of why I think it's a mistake to take your company public. If I put in the work to build up a successful business, no way would I ever let it be turned into a machine that ignores long term health for the sake of making the stock price go up.

Re: IBM to buy HashiCorp in $6.4B deal

#120

Post by silisili »

belter wrote: post #43
solardev wrote: post #35

I didn't know IBM still had money to throw around like that. What do they even do these days? Who are their customers?

This type of comment appears here every time the name IBM shows up, but it is more symptomatic, of the bubble a part of HN lives on. Think every core IT infra of most of the developed world countries, most of the ebanking and core messaging infra of your large banks and insurance companies, plus billions per year in consulting services revenue. https://www.ibm.com/products https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_IBM_pr…

This may be a slightly more clear wiki link, especially looking at post 2000 -

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mergers_and_acquisitio...

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