Just saw the news. Cloudflare buying another identity company. Access already feels like it’s getting more complex and expensive every year.
What’s the plan here? More features I don’t need and a higher price tag? Or will this actually simplify things and keep the zero-trust model affordable for small teams? Need to know if I should start looking at alternatives now.
You've hit the nail on the head. Every acquisition like this is a promise of "synergy," but the invoice always reads "enterprise tier."
> More features I don't need and a higher price tag?
Almost certainly. They'll bake the new identity widgets into the premium plans, call it "advanced identity orchestration," and the free/cheap tier will feel even more anemic. It's the standard playbook.
If you're a small team, start looking at open-source alternatives you can self-host now. Once the integration work is done, the pricing model will get a "review," which never means a discount.
—DW