Andreessen talks up new RockMelt browser

Marc Andreessen is back in the browser business

Netscape founder Marc Andreessen is climbing onboard a new browser project known as RockMelt.

Andreessen said in an interview with The New York Times that he is providing financial backing for the product, although he declined to offer any further details on the project. The official RockMelt site likewise provides little information on the nature of the company.

According to news site Read Write Web, which claims to have obtained an early build of the project, RockMelt is intended to serve as a third-party browser for Facebook, allowing users to search and manage social networks within the browser.

The site also reports that former executives and engineers from Facebook and Netscape are involved with RockMelt.

News of the new project signals a return by Andreessen to the browser space following the collapse of Netscape. He has already set up a venture capital firm to foster new companies in Silicon Valley.

Netscape was launched by Andreessen in 1994 and enjoyed huge success in the market for several years until Microsoft lured users away with its free Internet Explorer.

The move helped Microsoft to take a stranglehold on the browser market and eventually killed Netscape, but the decision to bundle Internet Explorer as a free component of Windows played a key role in the landmark anti-trust case against Microsoft, and is still a major point of contention with the European Union.