Edible Apple

Josh Lowensohn of CNET reports that Apple last month acquired a San Francisco based creative consulting company called Particle that specializes in HTML 5 and UI design.

Particle was founded in early 2008 and has some celebrity financial backing. Pop star-turned-actor Justin Timberlake is an investor and helped fund short social video service Robo.to, which Particle created. Sources with knowledge of the deal did not know the selling price.

The company has done HTML5 work for Google, Motorola, Amazon, Yahoo, Sony, and Apple. The group has also created some “labs” projects including Intervue.me, an asynchronous video interviewing project.

Notably, Lowensohn points out that Particle founder and CTO Aubry Anderson did consulting work for Apple between 2006 and 2008.

Particle brings positive and energetic relationships with Google and the Chrome team specifically, as well as great Apple relationships and execution experience around iAds, iTunes Extras, and Apple.com. We have participated in and piloted much of the technology which will display the next generation of advertising and deliver media content for the next decade.

And so Apple’s championing of HTML 5 continues.