By Ankit Ajmera
(Reuters) - Honeywell International Inc (NYSE:HON) launched a $100 million investment fund on Wednesday that will focus on technology startups.
Aerospace will be one of the key focus areas of the fund, said Murray Grainger, managing director of Honeywell Venture Capital LLC, which is based in Menlo Park, Silicon Valley.
"We will be looking at technologies that both enhance our core innovations, but then also look at anything that could potentially be disruptive," Grainger said.
Honeywell, like rival General Electric (NYSE:GE) Co, has been working on a range of connected technologies, which marry software and analytics with industrial products.
One such example is Honeywell's GoDirect maintenance services program, which flags critical faults in an aircraft that needs to be repaired and shares it with an airline's operations and maintenance centers.
GoDirect is part of Honeywell's connected aircraft services, which uses high-speed internet connections to send, receive and analyze data from an airplane's components and equipment.
The aerospace systems business, Honeywell's biggest by revenue, makes auxiliary power units and aircraft engines as well as turbochargers for passenger cars and commercial vehicles.
Honeywell joins construction and mining equipment maker Caterpillar Inc (NYSE:CAT), Scotch tape and Post-it notes maker 3M Co and Boeing (NYSE:BA) Co in setting up a venture capital fund that invests in start-ups across the world.