The infrastructure landscape for healthcare CIOs has shifted dramatically. Three converging pressures, including Broadcom’s 2025 licensing changes, surging hardware refresh costs, and the finalized HIPAA Security Rule, have made business as usual an expensive and risky proposition.
This guide is designed for IT leaders already navigating the complexities of the current VMware renewal environment. We provide the criteria you need to evaluate your path forward, including honest trade-offs and the questions you must ask any infrastructure provider, including Ark.
Renewal is a defensible choice if you are mid-Epic-optimization or mid-acquisition integration, but it serves only as a short-term bridge rather than a destination, requiring you to ask your CFO if the organization can justify the current cost trajectory for another three years and what the plan is for the next renewal.
While a proven path for some, public cloud requires a team with deep cloud architecture skills to manage the ongoing operational load, as the shared responsibility model leaves your organization solely responsible for the OS, PHI access controls, and the audit trail, often resulting in costs that—when factoring in data transfer and support—are not always cheaper than alternatives.
This path provides single-tenant dedicated infrastructure that offers inherent PHI isolation, keeps your team in control with full visibility into VM states and performance metrics, shifts unpredictable CapEx to a fixed monthly OpEx model, and provides a clear expansion path for future AI workloads without requiring contract renegotiations
Renewal is a defensible choice if you are mid-Epic-optimization or mid-acquisition integration, but it serves only as a short-term bridge rather than a destination, requiring you to ask your CFO if the organization can justify the current cost trajectory for another three years and what the plan is for the next renewal.
While a proven path for some, public cloud requires a team with deep cloud architecture skills to manage the ongoing operational load, as the shared responsibility model leaves your organization solely responsible for the OS, PHI access controls, and the audit trail, often resulting in costs that—when factoring in data transfer and support—are not always cheaper than alternatives.
This path provides single-tenant dedicated infrastructure that offers inherent PHI isolation, keeps your team in control with full visibility into VM states and performance metrics, shifts unpredictable CapEx to a fixed monthly OpEx model, and provides a clear expansion path for future AI workloads without requiring contract renegotiations
| Feature | Renew VMware | Public Cloud (AWS/Azure) | Ark Managed Private Cloud |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cost Structure | CapEx plus ongoing OpEx | Pure OpEx, variable | Fixed OpEx per node/month |
| PHI Control | On-premises, full control | Shared responsibility model | Single-tenant, dedicated |
| HIPAA Doc. | Self-managed | Provider plus customer shared | Provider-managed with attestation |
| Migration | None | High (Cloud architecture required) | Medium (6 to 8 weeks) |
| IT Impact | Status quo | Requires cloud ops skills | Lifecycle management offloaded |
| Feature | Renew VMware | Public Cloud (AWS/Azure) | Ark Managed Private Cloud |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cost Structure | CapEx plus ongoing OpEx | Pure OpEx, variable | Fixed OpEx per node/month |
| PHI Control | On-premises, full control | Shared responsibility model | Single-tenant, dedicated |
| HIPAA Doc. | Self-managed | Provider plus customer shared | Provider-managed with attestation |
| Migration | None | High (Cloud architecture required) | Medium (6 to 8 weeks) |
| IT Impact | Status quo | Requires cloud ops skills | Lifecycle management offloaded |
Safeguarding protected health information (PHI) is our top priority. Our HIPAA-compliant data centers feature 100% uptime, advanced physical access controls, and 24/7 monitoring. Compliance goes beyond boxes to check—it’s embedded in our operations, letting your teams focus on improving patient outcomes, not managing risk.
Modern healthcare workloads—from EHR systems to medical imaging analytics—demand robust compute and reliable connectivity. We provide colocation and cloud solutions that eliminate hardware bottlenecks and power everything from day-to-day patient records to real-time AI insights.
At Ark, we don’t just offer rack space. Our specialists collaborate with your IT and clinical stakeholders to design future-proof solutions, integrating hybrid cloud and carrier-neutral networks for maximum flexibility. Whether you’re migrating from aging on-premises data centers or expanding into new digital services, we tailor the roadmap to your specific needs.
Avoid the massive capital investments of building or upgrading your own data center. By leveraging Ark’s fully owned facilities, you lock in a transparent, predictable cost model—so you can invest more in innovation and patient experience, not data center overhead.
Safeguarding protected health information (PHI) is our top priority. Our HIPAA-compliant data centers feature 100% uptime, advanced physical access controls, and 24/7 monitoring. Compliance goes beyond boxes to check—it’s embedded in our operations, letting your teams focus on improving patient outcomes, not managing risk.
Modern healthcare workloads—from EHR systems to medical imaging analytics—demand robust compute and reliable connectivity. We provide colocation and cloud solutions that eliminate hardware bottlenecks and power everything from day-to-day patient records to real-time AI insights.
At Ark, we don’t just offer rack space. Our specialists collaborate with your IT and clinical stakeholders to design future-proof solutions, integrating hybrid cloud and carrier-neutral networks for maximum flexibility. Whether you’re migrating from aging on-premises data centers or expanding into new digital services, we tailor the roadmap to your specific needs.
Avoid the massive capital investments of building or upgrading your own data center. By leveraging Ark’s fully owned facilities, you lock in a transparent, predictable cost model—so you can invest more in innovation and patient experience, not data center overhead.
A global healthcare provider with 100,000+ employees and 40 hospitals, UPMC needed a secure, reliable solution to support critical workloads:
$100M in Savings: Freed crucial capital for patient-focused innovations.
99.999% Uptime: Ensured critical EHR systems stay online, protecting lives.
50% More Capacity: Expanded infrastructure without the costs of new builds.
Hybrid Cloud–Ready: Integrated public and private cloud to optimize data workflows.
With ark data centers as a trusted partner, UPMC modernized its IT while staying committed to world-class patient care.
We’re invested in healthcare at many levels, helping to shape how digital transformation impacts patients, healthcare professionals and healthcare facilities.
Healthcare is in the midst of sea change. Transformational IT and our commitment to deliver come together in our healthcare technology solutions to anticipate what’s next.
Healthcare is patient-focused, but it’s also a business. We’ve developed and enhanced our solutions and services to help achieve successful outcomes for everyone.
We’re here to listen, collaborate and help you build flexible modern technology solutions to transform your IT strategy.