Silver Curve is seeking a new round of funding on crowd investment platform Seedrs to advance development of Aperture, its graphics engine for digital signage. The London-based developer is asking for ￡125,000 for 8.5 percent of the business, with one fifth of the total already achieved at time of writing.

Since its launch last summer, Aperture has been integrated for end users by both Signageliveand Instoremedia on the Raspberry Pi chipset. This set-up offers more efficient and advanced graphics processing alongside reduced hardware drain, which Silver Curve claims could provide a per-screen saving of some ￡700 compared with Windows-based systems.

Now, Silver Curve is looking to encourage uptake amongst other manufacturers, with much of the investment slated to configure Aperture for non-Pi systems. It is understood that, at the stated funding level, two new chipsets would be available within twelve to 18 months; overfunding would accelerate development significantly.

"As soon as we release Aperture on a new platform, our partner vendors shouldn't have to do any work other than to certify the new product," suggests Bryan Crotaz, managing director of Silver Curve. "Usually they'd have to optimise their code for the CPU and GPU features. One vendor we spoke to has 48 different Android versions of their software, so this could provide them with significant savings in time and cost to market."

While the majority of the money will be spent on research and development, some will be used for working cashflow. Crotaz notes that all Silver Curve staff and freelancers have already invested, which he believes demonstrates their commitment to, and the security of, the product roadmap.