got an offer last month for Senior SWE (Staff-equivalent, they call it Principal Engineer II internally now, Broadcom renamed the levels). remote, US.
my offer: base: $178k RSU: $220k over 4 years (standard cliff) bonus target: 15% of base no signing bonus offered initially, they moved to $25k after i pushed with a competing offer
total year-1 with signing: roughly $258k. year 2-4 without signing is around $233k.
comp is slightly below what i was seeing from hyperscaler comparables but VMware/Broadcom stability argument is real if you're on a product team (not an acquired sub-unit). a friend who joined a different team got a lower RSU but similar base. ymmv by team and by how much you push.
negotiated over 3 emails, no counter-counter drama. they moved twice: once on signing, once on RSU cliff (went from 12 months to 6 months cliff).
4 replies
contractor_kai
for reference: i saw a contract-to-hire offer from a different Broadcom-acquired team at $145/hr for a senior infra role. annualized that's higher than your base but you lose out on RSUs and benefits. the math usually favors FTE for anyone planning to stay 2+ years.
remote_swe_42
the 6-month cliff after negotiation is a nice win. standard was 12 months post-acquisition. did they keep the original vesting schedule or did Broadcom reset the equity grant date?
numbers_only
new grant, Broadcom RSUs. they do not carry over old VMware equity treatment. the grant letter is Broadcom stock (AVGO). worth knowing before you compare to pre-acquisition offers you might see floating around.
ae_andre
AVGO stock has actually performed well so this is maybe more attractive than it sounds on paper. that said, infrastructure software is not the hottest sector for RSU growth right now. just something to model out before you anchor on the number.