These are tense days at Palo Alto-based VMware as geopolitical headwinds swirl across the Pacific between the United States and China. 

Shares of the virtualisation software firm, which had soared this past year, fell back some 16 per cent last week on worries that Chinese regulators, angered by America’s toughened rules on semiconductor shipments to China, will decline, or damagingly delay, approval for its US$61 billion (S$83.7 billion) merger with Broadcom, a maker of semiconductors. The Financial Times, citing industry sources, said Beijing may extend the review process indefinitely until both sides give up the deal.