India’s ShareChat in the race to succeed TikTok in India after the ban

A Twitter-backed Indian startup, ShareChat is on the race to succeed TikTok after the Indian government banned the social video app in late June. Other Indian start-ups have also shown interest in filling the vacuum TikTok left in India.

ShareChat is an Indian social media platform supported by Twitter. The social media platform also supports 15 regional languages in India.

The Indian government banned TikTok due to arising national security concerns. The ban was announced in New Delhi in late June 2020. Days later, ShareChat launched a similar short social video platform, Moj.

CEO and co-founder of ShareChat, Ankush Sachdeva told CNBC that the company had been “very, very opportunistic” as they realized that TikTok had left a very large vacuum in the short-video market.

“I still believe that there is a large appetite for short-video content and if we can provide a really good experience, that essentially translates to a really good AI (artificial intelligence)- backed feed, there is a large market to be captured,” Sachdeva said.

Before its ban in India, TikTok had over 200 million users. Following the ban, many of its Indian competitors saw an increase in users. Moj which launched in July, has over 80 million monthly active users who spend 34 minutes on average.

Last week, the Twitter-backed short-video platform said it raised $40 million in pre-Series E funds from different investors, including Pawan Munjal, CEO, and chairman of Hero Motorcorp, a manufacturer of motorcycles and scooters. Other investors include Twitter, an investment firm India Quotient, venture capital firms SAIF Partners and Lightspeed India.

The last quarter of 2020 is indeed unfavorable for the Chinese owned TikTok as the U.S. is also in talks to ban the company.