• Ubicloud offers open-source cloud computing services on bare-metal servers from providers like OVHcloud and AWS.
  • The platform prioritizes cost-efficiency and simplicity, aiming to provide a competitive alternative to existing cloud offerings.
  • Co-founded by tech veterans, Ubicloud received $16 million in funding and is poised for success with its unique approach to cloud services.

Startup Ubicloud is trying to establish an open-source cloud offering, which will compete with AWS.

Ubicloud will start its open-source cloud services business, aiming at providing a attracting alternative

Ubicloud, a new startup founded by the team behind Citus Data, which Microsoft acquired in 2019, wants to change the dynamics by offering a layer of core cloud computing services on top of affordable bare-metal servers from providers like Hetzner, OVH Cloud, Leaseweb, and AWS. A managed service is included and the open-source version allows developers to set up their own cloud on bare-metal providers.

By focusing on computing, PostgreSQL database services, networking capabilities, and future additions such as block storage and Kubernetes-based container service, Ubicloud aims to provide a compelling alternative to traditional hyperscale cloud offerings. Cubukcu, highlighting the company’s vision, stated, “We are absolutely big fans of the cloud… we see where there are ways to do it better or do it simpler.”

Developers are allowed to decide where they want to host their services. Now, it is said that one of the nice spots for Ubicloud is running GitHub Action runners. The company also finds that amount of users are spinning up machines for long-running workloads on the platform, as well as strong demand for its PostgreSQL database service.

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Different from AWS, the managed service of Ubicloud is available in 2 minutes

The famous and dominant platform in cloud service AWS has mammoth projects that aimed to provide the core services, mostly for on-permission use cases. Ever since the dawn of hyberscale clouds, AWS provided services through OpenStack, which is the typical representation. Even if it went through ups and downs, it has found stable standing points these years.

However, the Ubicloud team said they are totally different from AWS. “It reminds me a bit of Hadoop, where there is a consortium where a lot of different companies are coming together. It is open, yes, but then it supports 10 different flavors of operating systems and hypervisors — and to make it work, you really need an army of people. It is a solution, but you don’t have, for example, a managed OpenStack-as-a-service, right? It’s too complicated for that, whereas, with Ubicloud, our managed service is available from day one. You sign up, you can start using it in two minutes.”