Ansible itself is an open-source project kicked off a year ago by Michael DeHaan, one of the Red Hat vets who also spent time at Puppet Labs (see disclosure) and was also the force behind Cobbler, a popular Linux server installation tool.
In the ensuing year, Ansible has drawn some name-brand users including Aerospike, AppDynamics, Basho Technologies, Care.com and Gawker Media. And, as of Tuesday, AnsibleWorks will provide maintenance and service subscriptions for that toolset.