Katie MarsalApple has revealed that a major venture capitalist firm is making $100 million available to entrepreneurs looking to jumpstart businesses based on the iPhone and iPod touch.
Most of the investment will go to teams developing location-based services, mobile commerce, social networks, and other communication or entertainment add-ons for the mobile version of Mac OS X.
KPCB doesn't say whether it has established a particular system for distributing the money, but says it will invest venture capital to help the companies become completely independent. It also plans to lend its experience in both building startups as well as networking the young companies with partners they may need to expand.
The finances will be distributed chiefly by KPCB venture capitalist Matt Murphy as well as several other notable investors, including former Intel marketer and current Google board member John Doerr. To him, the SDK is an unusual chance to invest in a new and potentially successful category.
"A revolutionary new platform is a rare and prized opportunity for entrepreneurs, and that's exactly what Apple has created," Doerr says. "We think several significant new companies will emerge as this new platform evolves."
More news from today's Apple event
Malcolm Owen
Andrew O'Hara
William Gallagher
34 Comments
That's one big bang of a startup fund.
Now this is impressive, and more like the Apple I grew up with! Is the Great Woz in charge of the fund allocation?
The finances will be distributed chiefly by KPCB venture capitalist Matt Murphy as well as several other notable investors...
Matt "guitar" Murphy, Duck Dunn, Bones Malone......
This $100M iFund, Apple fronting the bill for Exchange support instead of charging for it per person, and the very low $99 developer fee means that total cost of ownership for the iPhone will be lower than the competition.
Apple really seems to be gunning for RiM's marketshare.
Huh? What connection do the iFund and Exchange support have with each other? I'm not following you.
Oh wait, never mind, you weren't connecting them, you were just listing them. my mistake.