UK indie Neon Play has become the first mobile game developer to receive the Queen's Award for Enterprise.

The prize is the highest official award for UK businesses, with winners named annually by Queen Elizabeth II on the advice of the UK's prime minister.

The award is designed to "recognise outstanding achievements by UK companies in three categories: International Trade, Innovation and Sustainable Development."

Development royalty

Neon Play has been named in the Innovation category, and will be formally presented with the award by Dame Janet Trotter, the Lord Lieutenant of Gloucestershire later this year.

"We have been lucky enough to win 12 business awards in the last year or so, but this crowns the lot and is the cherry on top of the icing on the cake," said Neon Play CEO Oli Christie of the award.

"We are hugely honoured to win a Queen's Award for Innovation. For such a young company in Cirencester to win this genuinely prestigious award is a huge moment in Neon Play's short history."

Along with other Queen's Award winners, Christie and Neon Play CTO Mark Allen will be invited to meet the Queen at a Buckingham Palace reception in July 2013.