The managed cloud in context

The Rackspace managed cloud, our public cloud, is built to comply with the open-source OpenStack specification. We’re a founder of OpenStack and we continue to contribute to its ongoing development. When your workload runs in our managed cloud, it’s managed and supported by Rackers on Rackspace infrastructure in Rackspace data centers. The flexibility of OpenStack backed by the support of Rackspace is a unique and powerful combination; as a user of our managed cloud, you can expect to benefit from that synergy.

If someday you choose to work with an OpenStack cloud but prefer not to do so within the Rackspace managed cloud, you can expect that transition to be easy. When you are a Rackspace customer operating in the Rackspace managed cloud, several alternatives are a short distance away:

• You can use our Managed Private Cloud product to create and operate your own cloud on infrastructure managed by Rackspace.

• You can install OpenStack yourself, on your own equipment, and manage your own cloud with your own personnel on your own infrastructure. DevStack can help you quickly build your own OpenStack cloud, potentially suitable for your internal software development.

• You can find another provider and use their OpenStack-compliant public cloud. The OpenStack Marketplace can help you identify other OpenStack cloud providers.