Qik attracts Andreessen-Horowitz investment

Netscape co-founder Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz have thrown their financial support behind Qik, making a significant investment in the mobile live-video service, the company announced Tuesday.

The announcement comes roughly a month after Qik debuted its public beta, with several new features designed to improve the service that allows users to stream live video from their cell phones to the Internet, onto such sites as YouTube, Mogulus, MySpace, Orkut and Justin.tv.

Andreessen and Horowitz will also serve as board advisors on Qik.

“We are thrilled to have Marc and Ben involved in Qik, both as investors and advisors,” Ramu Sunkara, Qik chief executive, said in a statement. “Marc is a true visionary and seasoned technology investor. He brings strong entrepreneurial and innovation experience to Qik. It is great to have them both on board to help us grow Qik and guide us on how we can change the way people communicate and share live experiences around the world.”

Qik is the not the first time Andreessen and Horowitz have teamed up. In addition to Netscape, the pair previously joined forces as co-founders of Internet hosting company Loudcloud, which launched an IPO in 2001 to a lukewarm reception. The company later changed its business model to an IT automation software company and re-named itself Opsware, later selling itself to Hewlett-Packard for $1.6 billion last year.

Horowitz is general manager of HP’s Business Technology Organization Unit, while Andreessen is co-founder of social networking platform Ning.com.

While Qik did not disclose the size of the Andreessen-Horowitz investment, other than to characterize it as significant, competitor Upstream.tv raised $11.1 million in its first round of venture funding in April.

Other Qik investors include Marc Benioff, Salesforce.com chief executive, Arjun Gupta, founder and managing partner of Telesoft Partners and George Garrick, chief executive of Jingle Networks.