Confluent - IBM acquisition, 3 months in
Confluent - IBM acquisition, 3 months in
Been at Confluent for 2 years. Here's what's actually changed since IBM closed the deal.
Headcount freeze is real. No backfills for departed engineers, new roles on hold. Our team is down two people with no replacement timeline.
Process overhead went up. More approval gates for infrastructure changes. Smaller decisions now need sign-offs that didn't exist before.
Team-level stuff hasn't changed much yet. Same codebase, same product priorities, same manager. IBM hasn't touched our sprint cadence.
The nervous energy is real though. Anyone who's been through an acquisition knows month 3 isn't when things change - it's month 9 or 12 when the reorganizations start.
I'm not updating my resume yet. But I've opened it a few times.
Replies (4)
headcount freeze at 3 months post-acquisition is a red flag. usually means they're evaluating team overlap before deciding what to cut
the month 9-12 window is accurate. first few months are always 'business as usual' messaging, then the org changes hit
did they consolidate any benefits yet? usually that's where you feel it first - healthcare plan changes, 401k matching differences
not yet. our open enrollment is Q4 so we'll see then
I left Confluent in January before the IBM deal closed. timing was unintentionally good I guess