(I'm the co-founder/CEO.) We're hoping to make the developer experience of Skyliner comparable, and eventually better, than Heroku, because they have done so well on that front. There are plenty of other tools that are essentially automation for API access to AWS; we're trying to do something different, making the operation of infrastructure as easy (or easier than) as the other part of Amazon.
Where I think we really differ from Heroku is in approach. Instead of a fully-enclosed platform that adds a tax for each cloud resource you use, we want to be an abstraction of AWS that allows you to break through that abstraction when needed. There are over 50 AWS products, and we don't support them all yet. If you need to use Redshift or API Gateway or whatever else, we want to make it easy for you to get up to speed in just that one product, and hook it into your Skyliner resources. Your alternatives should not be so stark as "fully managed, no control" versus "a box of Legos, figure it out."
Finally, we're focused on building a resilient architecture for growth. We want it to be easy and obvious how your starting infrastructure can support your company growing to be as successful as you're able to be. If a platform gets you started but then falls over when you have a good day, that's not a big help. Our goal is to provide tools that work as well on your first day as on your best day.
Hope that helps. marc@skyliner.io if I can answer anything else.
