Mendix, Inc. got an important endorsement for its rapid application development technology this week as Hewlett-Packard Co. named the company’s rapid application development platform a preferred technology for HP’s Helion cloud. However, the non-exclusive, non-binding relationship is something short of a commitment on either side.

Founded five years ago in Rotterdam and now based in Boston, Mendix sells an application platform-as-a-service based on OpenStack that uses model-driven visual programming and rules-based development to generate applications quickly for multiple platforms. The 200-person company, which has raised $38 million in two funding rounds since 2012, has about 500 paying customers and thousands of users of its free community edition, according to Marketing VP Gottfried Sehringer. Mendix is one of the first “Helion-Ready” certified independent software vendors.

Mendix has turned some heads with reports that its toolset can deliver six times higher productivity than typical development platforms. As a pure OpenStack play, HP’s endorsement is “a huge deal for a company our size,” Sehringer said.

Writing on the HP blog, Cloud Evangelist Stephen Spector said the alliance has “tremendous growth opportunities” and that the partnership will enable faster IT by “removing technical barriers, directly enabling business users and business innovation.” Mendix CTO Johan den Haan and HP Senior VP of Cloud Marten Mickos also appeared together on the keynote stage yet HP’s Discover conference in Barcelona this week (see video below).

But the alliance is so far in the early stages. Mendix has released a version of its rapid development platform designed specifically for Helion, but HP isn’t currently reselling Mendix products or integrating its technology. Mendix is also free to ally with other cloud platform providers. “It’s a go-to-market partnership that we will sell together,” Sehringer said. “How far it’s going to go time will tell.”