RightScale specializes in cloud management, but it has always limited itself to working with pre-existing deployments. Well, no longer, as the Cloud Computing Expo saw the debut of RightScale myCloud, which lets administrators and cloud service providers turn existing infrastructure into private and hybrid clouds. If that sounds like the value proposition of a vendor such as Cloud.com or Eucalyptus Systems, good eye – RightScale’s teamed up with those cloud companies to support both as options.

Basically, myCloud is a step further than RightScale’s previous cloud management efforts, but still plays to RightScale’s strengths. Rather than try to roll its own IaaS platform, RightScale’s press release noted it worked closely with Cloud.com and Eucalyptus to make sure it supported both right out of the increasingly figurative box.

The way it works is simple, to hear the company describe it: Download a RightScale myCloud software package, install it on-premises, pick your IaaS backend, and connect the newly propped-up cloud to the RightScale Cloud Management suite. From there, it’s all about managing resources and deploying templates and applications on top of it.

RightScale is hyping it as ideal for testing cloud solutions – and if you like what you see, myCloud makes it easy to connect it to a production workload in the Amazon EC2 or Rackspace Cloud, joining the public and private resources as a true hybrid cloud.

Here’s what Michael Crandell, CEO of RightScale, had to say about myCloud in a prepared statement:

“RightScale has always focused on making it easier and more productive to manage and automate applications in the cloud, and now with myCloud we are taking our support for private and hybrid clouds to the next level. RightScale myCloud makes on-premise cloud computing a viable option for all our customers by enabling an easy on-ramp and then offering a path to build out whatever multi-cloud environment they need. This is our vision for the future of hybrid clouds.”

This is one of those moves that just makes sense: RightScale and Cloud.com, especially, are very tight, and the latter has been very vocal about its belief in a hybrid cloud future. So choosing to partner rather than buy or even build its own IaaS would be akin to reinventing the wheel. And getting more involved with the deployment stage of the cloud is just a way to expand RightScale’s business.

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