Mirantis, one of the largest OpenStack systems integrators, just released an extensive library that it has been using internally to speed up deployment at client sites. The startup used the package, called FUEL, to configure and implement OpenStack for PayPal, WebEx, NASA and a number of other high-profile organizations.

“At PayPal, we are committed to collaborating with the open source community to drive further innovation.

“That’s why we are thrilled to be working with Mirantis to leverage OpenStack to help transform our global infrastructure into an agile and open cloud platform,” said Saran Mandair, senior director of Platform Engineering and Operations. “Our OpenStack project uses the FUEL library by Mirantis, which has dramatically accelerated our OpenStack deployment with robust, production-grade architecture, while giving us the flexibility to tailor OpenStack to our needs.”

 FUEL consists of tried-and-tested deployment scripts that range from configurations for PoC to “highly available configurations for production use cases.”  It supports the standard version of OpenStack as well as third party distributions, and features compatibility with legacy systems.  The source code can be freely downloaded from Mirantis’ website.

The OpenStack ecosystem’s rapid growth can be credited in part to the startups leading the charge.  Two weeks ago, another emerging player called SwiftStack raised $6.1 million in a series A round of funding led by Mayfield fund.

SwiftStack, which had previously raised 1.5 million in seed capital, offers an OpenStack-based storage virtualization platform. By abstracting away the underlying hardware, this technology allows corporate IT departments to operate corporate data centers almost as efficiently as  public cloud providers such as Amazon.

Rackspace, the original creator of OpenStack, is also working on making the platform more viable for enterprises.  Analyst Stu Miniman discussed the company’s open-source private cloud solution in a piece on the Wikibon blog.