A Fife-based firm has won £600,000 backing for efforts to develop technology that it claims will allow people to watch their favourite television programmes anywhere in the world.

Inxstor raised the money from Braveheart, the listed investment business, and the Scottish Executive's Scottish Co-investment Fund as it prepares to take its products to market in the first quarter next year.

Based in Dunfermline, Inxstor is a pioneer of so-called place-shifting technology, which takes the concept of on-demand viewing offered by the likes of Sky a stage further.

While the satellite broadcaster's Sky Plus package allows people to watch programmes that have already been shown on television at a time of their choosing, the service can only be used on subscribers' home systems.

Inxstor's systems should allow people to view programmes using devices like laptop computers and mobile telephones wherever they are.

The technology works by converting images and sound from home video equipment into digital signals which are transmitted for downloading at the required viewing location over the internet.

Braveheart said Inxstor's technology was believed to be the only place-shifting solution that allowed digital content to be accessed from a remote location in a secure way.

Tony Combe, chief executive of Inxstor, said with the market for place-shifting expected to be worth $700m (£350m) annually by 2011, the firm had a huge market to aim at.

He said Inxstor would sell technology to manufacturers of set-top boxes that provide sophisticated links between television sets and the outside world, and to makers of mobile devices such as telephones and palm-top devices.

The company has signed a memorandum of understanding with Pace, a leading set-top box maker. It has held early stage talks with mobile phone giants including Nokia and Motorola. It also hopes to sell to individual consumers.

The funds raised will allow Inxstor to beef up its commercial and development systems in advance of commercial launch next year. Besides Combe the only employee currently is technical director Glenn Craib.

Combe said the company expected to achieve sales of more than £1m in 2008 and to move into operating profit in the fourth quarter.

Braveheart supported the spin out of Inxstor from another Scottish technology firm, Infinite Data Storage, last year, alongside other investors.

The investment company has a significant minority interest in Inxstor.