Former Microsoft games head Shane Kim joins board at Moai engine company Zipline

Best known for his role as games head of Microsoft's Xbox business, Shane Kim now has a hand in mobile development, taking up a role on the board of Washington-based Zipline Games.

The outfit is behind the recently launched Moai development suite, which allows studios write games for multiple platforms using its Lua script-driven SDK.

Titlers are then deployed via the firm's server infrastructure Moai Cloud.

Multiplatform matters

According to VentureBeat, it's Zipline's ability to support multiple formats in this way that attracted Kim's attention.

"I've looked at a lot of companies but this is the rare case where I decided to join the board," Kim told the site, having previously noticed the company owing to its cross-platform functionality.

Though Moai offers support for Windows, Linux and Mac, of particular interest to Kim is its role in Android and iOS development.

Zipline itself claims Moai's manipulation of the Lua engine allows it to compile libraries from C++ for native apps on both platforms faster than in Objective C. As a whole, the speed of the title that results is in the words of the firm's FAQ - "wicked fast".

It's not the first time Kim has taken up a post at a firm after his 19 year stint at Microsoft, however, having previously taken up advisory roles at monetisation firm Jambool and, most recently, retailer GameStop.

[source: Zipline]