Citrix Puts Money Behind Mobile Cloud With Core Mobile Investment

Citrix Systems' investment in the cloud mobile cloud

The investment in Core Mobile Networks, which marks the third funding commitment for Citrix's Startup Accelerator investment, gives the Santa Clara, Calif.-based company the ability to piggy-back on Citrix's global presence while giving it exposure to Citrix's customer and partner bases. The Core Mobile investment shows that Citrix is eyeing mobile cloud computing as the next big thing.

"The popularity of the cloud and rapid growth in smartphone and tablet adoption by business users is creating the need for enterprise IT to make cloud-based services more easily accessible from mobile devices," Core Mobile Networks CEO and founder Chandra Tekwani said in a statement. "The Citrix vision for enabling anyone to work and play anywhere on any device really resonated with our business goals, making it a natural next step to join the Citrix Startup Accelerator Program to help us propel our momentum."

Core Mobile Networks correlates information from enterprise IT systems with content in the cloud and delivers that data to mobile devices in real time and that is context aware. The company's first targets will be mobile business users leveraging the Apple iPhone and Google Android-base smartphones, Citrix said.

"Core Mobile addresses a gap in delivering useful content to end users of cloud-based services with a technology that identifies the most relevant subset of content, correlates it across multiple sources, and delivers it via a user-friendly interface that fits the small display of a smartphone -- all in real time," said John McIntyre, Citrix Startup Accelerator senior director, in a statement.

Citrix founded the Startup Accelerator program to scout out new technologies and business models that can create new capabilities across various markets that Citrix serves, including virtualization, cloud, mobility, networking, security, storage, collaboration and SaaS. The initiative offers seed investments to select startups and bolsters their go-to-market strategies. Selected companies receive up to $400,000 in seed money; a home at the Citrix Startup Accelerator Center in the Silicon Valley for up to 18 months; access to Citrix products, technology and technologist; and other benefits.

"The goal of the Citrix Startup Accelerator is to equip innovative entrepreneurs like Core Mobile with the key resources that will help them achieve the rapid market traction and customer validation that will help make their ideas a reality," McIntyre added.

Core Mobile Networks is the third company Citrix has backed since the Citrix Startup Accelerator launched in December 2010. Previous investments include Primadesk, a Novato, Calif.-based company that helps users search, manage and backup their personal cloud data with one interface no matter what device they use. The other Startup Accelerator investment was in a stealth mode company, Citrix said. Citrix expects to invest in more startups based upon its recent Startup Accelerator Global Challenge.