Ludei has received $1.5 million in funding from Kibo Ventures, Vitamina K and several angel investors to expand its JavaScript/HTML5 engineering team and bring its development platform to app developers beyond the gaming industry.
Back in February, we covered Ludei’s mission to prove that HTML5 standards are viable for game developers even after Mark Zuckerberg admitted that Facebook’s mobile strategy relied too much on HTML5 rather than native applications. Now Ludei says that it is growing its team in order to answer increasing demand from technology and entertainment companies for its HTML5 multi-platform development products.
“This funding further validates our approach to HTML5 development. HTML5 has taken a lot of criticism in recent years and it’s true that on its own, it performs poorly on mobile,” Ludei CEO Eneko Knorr said in a statement. “But our team and the world-class developers using our platform are proving every day that with the right support, HTML5 is ready for primetime, and we’re positioned to take on the biggest players in the app industry.”
Ludei faces competition from Game Closure for gaming clients, but Ludei says that it has the only HTML5 platform that brings native performance and features to mobile app developers.
More than 6,000 developers, including three of the top 20 game publishers in the world, currently use the Ludei platform to power HTML5 applications, which enables them to code once, then monetize and market applications across multiple platforms with native-like features. More than 500 iOS and Android games have been developed using the platform, including ScribbleMix, Lunch ZBug, Bubble Soccer and Rhino Hero. Ludei is the only platform that supports WebGL on iOS and Android devices. It also supports new platforms like Ouya and Tizen.
Ludei investors Kibo Ventures and Vitamina K are both based in Spain. Kibo Ventures supports Spanish startups in the Internet and mobile space and is currently investing in Amerigo Innvierte Spain Technologies FCR Fund, part of the Amerigo network sponsored by Telefonica and CDTI. Its other portfolio companies include international education payment platform peerTransfer and film and production directory Visualnet. Vitamina K invests in Internet-based companies around the world, including video monetization platform The Mad Video.
Ludei’s initial funding came from Knorr, a serial entrepreneur who sold his previous company Hostalia, to Telefonica in 2007. This round brings Ludei’s total funding to $4.5 million.