Intel ploughs £63m into mobile app development

Intel Capital, Intel's global investment organisation, is set to invest $100m (£63m) in innovative companies that are developing applications for the mobile market.

The chosen companies will develop apps for Intel's AppUp centre, an app store for netbooks and laptops.

"The explosion of connected computing devices has created tremendous opportunity for entrepreneurs to create and build businesses to meet the unprecedented demand for new and innovative computing applications and digital content," said Arvind Sodhani, president of Intel Capital.

"The Intel Capital AppUp Fund will help encourage the creation of companies interested in delivering or enabling applications that enhance and extend the online experience for the 15 billion devices expected to be connected by 2015."

The fund will invest in companies producing infrastructure, middleware, applications and digital content across all types of mobile devices.

The first two companies to benefit from the fund are Urban Airship, a mobile platform-as-a-service company, and 4tiitoo, a German company that specialises in open source software.

Intel has also suggested that it is interested in investing in cross-platform technologies such as HTML5.

"The Intel Capital AppUp Fund further demonstrates Intel's support of the mobile market segment, and creating exciting apps and digital content for Intel architecture is at the centre of our AppUp efforts," said Renee James, Intel senior vice president and general manager of Intel's software and services group.