---
id: CUST-BMC-RAIL-2026-000001
type: business_model
title: "Railiance-as-a-Service — Business Model Canvas v0.1"
status: draft
owners: ["Bernd", "Custodian"]
created: "2026-07-08"
updated: "2026-07-08"
scope:
  domains: ["Railiance"]
  sensitivity: internal
tags: ["business-model", "railiance", "saas", "sovereignty"]
---

# Railiance-as-a-Service — Business Model Canvas v0.1

## Offering

**Railiance-as-a-Service (RaaS)** packages the OAS-aligned operational substrate
as a managed or consultatively operated service for EU SMEs that need sovereign,
GDPR-compliant DevOps without vendor lock-in.

Core deliverable:

- managed k3s cluster (or customer-owned cluster under Railiance runbooks)
- observability stack (metrics, logs, traces)
- GitOps deployment lane (ArgoCD or equivalent)
- encrypted backup + documented restore drills
- governance overlay using FOS hub pattern (dev, ops, fin separation)

Differentiator: **VSM-based organizational architecture**, not just
infrastructure. Customers receive operational reliability *and* a coordination
model that scales from founder-led ops to multi-domain federation.

## Customer Segments

| Segment | Profile | Primary pain |
| --- | --- | --- |
| **EU SME — regulated** | 10–200 staff, DSGVO/AI Act exposure | Cannot depend on US hyperscaler control planes |
| **EU SME — technical** | Has developers, weak ops | Founder ops does not survive absence |
| **Internal ventures** | Bernd ecosystem repos | Need reproducible substrate before external sale |

Initial focus: internal dogfooding through the Custodian/Railiance stack until
restore drills and cost attribution are proven.

## Value Proposition

1. **Sovereign ops** — EU-hostable, provider-independent, auditable.
2. **Reproducible deployments** — same inputs produce the same system.
3. **Operational minimalism** — boring primitives, explicit runbooks.
4. **Federation-ready** — customers can grow from single-hub to multi-hub without rewrite.
5. **Agent-safe governance** — tool-boundary policy, immutable audit, human override.

## Channels

| Phase | Channel |
| --- | --- |
| v0.1 (now) | Internal use, direct founder network |
| v0.2 | Consultative engagements (architecture review + managed cutover) |
| v0.3 | Productized tiers with self-serve onboarding docs |

## Customer Relationships

- **Self-hosted tier**: community/docs support, customer operates stack.
- **Managed tier**: Railiance operates cluster; customer owns data plane.
- **Fully operated tier**: Railiance operates cluster + incident response + change management.

All tiers include documented restore drills and evidence exports for compliance.

## Revenue Streams

| Tier | Model | Indicative pricing (draft) |
| --- | --- | --- |
| **Open / self-hosted** | €0 + optional support hours | OSS templates + paid support blocks |
| **Managed** | Monthly per cluster + per-node | €400–1,200/mo base + €50–150/node |
| **Fully operated** | Monthly retainer + incident SLA | €1,500–4,000/mo depending on SLA |

Revenue recognition waits on GmbH formation and first paying customer (see
`bootstrap-protocol_v0.1.md`).

## Key Resources

- Railiance k3s fleet (railiance01, Forgejo, OpenBao, activity-core)
- Core Hub ops evidence surface (production since 2026-07-03)
- hub-core / dev-hub coordination stack
- Canon standards (FOS, OAS, IAM Profile v0.2)
- Operator runbooks and restore-drill evidence

## Key Activities

- Cluster provisioning and GitOps baseline
- Backup/restore drill execution and evidence capture
- Observability and cost attribution (OpenCost path)
- Customer onboarding and hub registration
- Compliance documentation (DSGVO posture, subprocessors)

## Key Partners

- HostEurope / EU hosting for bare metal or VPS substrate
- Forgejo/Gitea for sovereign source control
- OpenBao for secret custody
- EU legal counsel for GmbH, SLA, and liability framework (T26)

## Cost Structure

| Category | Examples |
| --- | --- |
| **Infrastructure** | HostEurope servers, storage, egress |
| **LLM / API** | Anthropic, OpenRouter token spend (tracked via fin-hub T24) |
| **Labor** | Technical Operator time (founder-heavy in v0.1) |
| **Compliance** | Legal review, insurance, audit tooling |

Runway and burn-rate tracking are fin-hub responsibilities (`CUST-WP-0025-T23`–`T25`).

## Pricing Tiers (Feature Matrix — Draft)

| Feature | Self-hosted | Managed | Fully operated |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| k3s cluster templates | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| GitOps baseline | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Observability stack | docs | ✓ | ✓ |
| Backup + restore drills | customer-run | quarterly evidence | monthly evidence |
| Incident response | — | business hours | 24×7 option |
| FOS hub coordination | docs | dev+ops hubs | full federation setup |
| Cost/runway dashboard | — | optional | ✓ |
| SLA | — | 99.5% target | contractual |

## MVP Scope (Before First External Customer)

Must exist:

1. One production Railiance cluster with documented restore drill pass.
2. Core Hub ops evidence lane live (done 2026-07-03).
3. IAM Profile v0.2 integration template (done).
4. fin-hub runway calculator with manual cost import (T24).
5. Onboarding runbook: customer → provisioned cluster + monitoring.
6. Legal review of GmbH implications and liability cap (T26).

## Risks and Open Questions

- GmbH formation timing vs. pre-revenue consulting
- Liability scope for managed tier incident response
- Whether RaaS leads with consultancy or productized tiers
- OpenCost integration vs. manual CSV for v0.1 cost ingestion

## References

- `canon/projects/railiance/project_charter_v0.1.md`
- `canon/projects/railiance/roadmap_v0.1.md`
- `canon/standards/orthogonal-architecture_v1.0.md`
- `canon/standards/federated-organization-standard_v1.0.md`
- `docs/core-hub-cutover-decision-coupling.md`