Platform-as-a-service startup Heroku has launched an Add-On Provider Program that will provide a self-service portal and development kit for third-party service providers. The program provides a complete suite of technologies, business processes, and services necesssary to build Heroku Add-ons.
Heroku offers a Ruby platform-as-a-service that focuses on ease of use, automation, and reliability for web app builders. The third-party add-ons allow developers to easily integrate additional functionality into the apps they build on the Heroku platform. The catalog of add-ons already available includes full-text search services, NoSQL and SQL data stores, analytics tools, video transcoding technologies, and performance management services.
Heroku’s new Add-on Provider Program will provide a process for bringing new add-ons from beta through release. The development kit includes a provisioning API, manifest format, single sign-on mechanism, and testing tools for integration with the Heroku platform. In exchange for the development kit and billing service, Heroku splits the revenue with the third-party developers.
Heroku has developed this new program in conjunction with the add-on providers it’s already had in place. The company says it’s dedicated to building a neutral marketplace of cloud services and anticipates that the program will help strength the Heroku platform. “A true platform is much broader than any single vendor – building a sustainable ecosystem of technologies, services, and resources is a key part of the Heroku vision,” says James Lindenbaum, co-founder of Heroku.
Heroku says this is the first comprehensive third-party app development offering by a Cloud PaaS provider – a move that makes sense in terms of strengthening the Heroku market and ecosystem.
