IBM can solidify its position as a leading multi-cloud enabler via its acquisition of HashiCorp

IBM announced, in April 2024, that it has agreed to acquire HashiCorp for USD6.4 billion. HashiCorp is known for its development of infrastructure-as-code (IaC) tools, particularly Terraform, which enables users to efficiently define and provision data centre infrastructure across multiple cloud providers and on-premises environments.

IBM aims to use this acquisition to complement its purchase of Red Hat and enhance its role as a vendor-neutral multi-cloud provider that supports operators and enterprises to manage diverse cloud environments for IT, network functions and AI workloads. However, the success of the acquisition may hinge on the decision to revert Terraform’s business licence to an open-source model. Indeed, IBM has a strong reputation in the open-source community and understands the critical role that that it plays in driving the success of a solution. IBM and HashiCorp therefore need to regain the support of the developer community to ensure that Terraform remains an important tool in the multi-cloud automation space.