brokered.html.md.erb

---
title: Brokered Service
owner: Services
---

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The topics in this subsection explain how to integrate your software service with Pivotal Cloud Foundry (PCF) to create a brokered service and service tile for PCF.

## <a id="overview"></a> Overview

You can achieve the first real improvement in your PCF customers user experience by creating a [Service Broker](service-brokers.html) for your service.

A brokered service runs external to PCF, but it has a tile on [Pivotal Network](http://network.pivotal.io) (PivNet). Operators install, configure, and upgrade the tile through the Ops Manager Installation Dashboard.

The service broker eliminates the need for your customers to know the URLs and
credentials for your services; they are managed automatically by the
broker.

Building a broker for a (still) externally deployed service is generally
a good way to publish a first tile that adds real value for customers who have both your software and PCF.

## <a id="create"></a> Create a Brokered Service

* A brokered service requires a service broker, which publishes an API to the Cloud Controller.  
[Service Brokers](./service-brokers.html) explains how to create one. 

* [Route Services](./service-brokers.html#route) explains how to create a route service, for use in the routing layer of PCF rather than by hosted PCF apps.

* [Catalog](./service-brokers.html#catalog) explains how to design the part of your service broker API that publishes service plan information to the Services Marketplace.

* You can write your service broker in the language of your choice.  
[Buildpacks](./buildpacks.html) explains how to create a language-specific buildpack that compiles and packages your service broker to run on PCF.

* Once you have the individual components for your brokered service integration, you can work through the [development steps](./development.html) to create your tile.

At any level of integration, Pivotal recommends and supports using [Concourse](./concourse.html) for continuous integration during development.