BQ PRIME - Mohalla Tech Pvt., the parent of the social networking app ShareChat and the short video app Moj, has laid off ~20% of its workforce (~500 employees). The company said it needs to "prepare to sustain" through "several external macro factors that impact the cost and availability of capital." The company confirmed that it will pay the total salary for the notice period and allow employees to retain all vested ESOPs, and the options will continue to vest as per schedule up until Apr 30.
18 posts categorized "ShareChat"
ShareChat Fires 20% Workforce Months After Raising US$ 255M
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ShareChat Parent Shuts Fantasy Gaming Platform, Lays Off ~5% Employees
YOUR STORY - Bangalore-based Mohalla Tech Private Limited, the parent company of social media platform ShareChat and video-sharing social networking service Moj, has shut its fantasy gaming platform Jeet11, laying off about 5% of its workforce. Jeet11 has 2.3K employees in total. The laid-off employees largely were from non-tech roles. Tech employees would be absorbed into Sharechat and Moj.
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After Meta, ShareChat Pulls up the Wire for 'Conjuring up' Stories
THE COMMUNE MAG - ShareChat released a statement against The Wire and asked them to take down an article written by one Dinesh Kumar as well as other related reports. This comes days after Meta and The Wire were engaged in controversy after The Wire, in an article, alleged that Instagram posts were deleted whenever BJP IT cell head Amit Malviya reported any.
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ShareChat Raises $255M, Valued at $5B
LIVE MINT - Indian social media and social networking service, ShareChat, have raised $255M in funds from Google, Times Group, and Temasek. With this, the home-grown social media firm reached $5B in valuation with its multi-tranche funding round.
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Google Pumps $300M in ShareChat at $5B Valuation
TECH OBSERVER - Google has backed India's ShareChat with $300M in fresh funding. As per initial estimates, the valuation of the social media platform is pegged at ~$5B. ShareChat currently has 180M monthly active users. The firm also counts Twitter and Snap among its investors. If the bid by Musk to buy Twitter goes through, Musk will have potentially a stake of between 6% and 8% in ShareChat.
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Mohalla Tech Raised $913M in 2021
TIMES NOW NEWS - Mohalla Tech, parent company of Moj and Sharechat, has raised $913M across three fundraise rounds in 2021. Co-founder & CEO Ankush Sachdeva says all the funds raised this year is to build a M&A warchest, double down on growth, launch new products and invest in new tech especially machine learning and AI.
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ShareChat Parent in Talks to Raise $500M at $5B Value
LIVEMINT - Mohalla Tech, the company that operates social networking services Moj and ShareChat, is in early talks to raise $500M to $600M as part of a new fundraiser. The startup is expected to raise funds at a valuation of $5B. The size of the fundraising can be raised to $650M amid interest from foreign investors. The latest fundraising plans have come on the heels of Mohalla Tech raising ~$647M this year.
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ShareChat and Moj in Multi-year Music Licensing Deal With T-Series
IANS - Aug 5 - Mohalla Tech, the parent company of short video app Moj and Indic language social media platform ShareChat, announced a multi-year agreement with music label T-Series. The partnership allows ShareChat and Moj to access an extensive catalog of Indian music and provide an enhanced experience to its creator communities. Moj and ShareChat together, with a 340M-strong MAU community and ~82M creator community, represent a significant share of the internet population in India.
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Temasek Co-leads $145M Round of Twitter-backed Indian Social Media Firm
TECH IN ASIA - July 28 - India's Mohalla Tech, which operates social networking platform ShareChat and short-video app Moj, has raised $145M in a new funding round led by Temasek and Moore Streategic Ventures.
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ShareChat Builds Regional Language Live Audio Product, Enables Monetize
BUSINESS STANDARD - June 15 - Regional language-based social network Sharechat has successfully built and helped creators monetize a live audio product called Chatrooms. The tech team of ShareChat said, "After launching in April 2020, we grew quickly to become the largest live audio product in the country, with 1.2B minutes being streamed on our platform monthly."
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ShareChat Parent Mohalla Tech Raises $502M; Now Valued at $2.1B
THE HINDU - Apr 9 - Mohalla Tech (founded in 2015), the parent company behind Indian social media platforms such as Moj and ShareChat has raised $502M in a funding round led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and Tiger Global, valuing the firm at ~$2.1B. The funding round also saw participation from Snap Inc, Twitter, and India Quotient, amongst others. The new round will be utilized for doubling down on tech initiatives, supporting user growth, and improving platform safety features.
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ShareChat Eyes a $200M Round From Tencent
KRASIA - Feb 26 - Bengaluru-based social media platform ShareChat, which also operates short-video app Moj, is looking to land a check of $200M from Chinese technology major Tencent. The funding will be raised through optionally convertible debentures and routed via a Europe-based entity. Optionally convertible debentures are long-term debt instruments that can be converted into shares of equity stock after a specified period. If the transaction goes through, it could subsequently lead to a change in management control of ShareChat. The startup claims to have 160 million active users on its main social networking app and 80 million on its short-video app, Moj.
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Twitter Explored Buying ShareChat and Turning Moj Into a Global TikTok Rival
TECH CRUNCH - Feb 23 - Twitter recently held talks to acquire Indian social media startup ShareChat as the company explored ways to expand its presence in the world's second-largest internet market and build a global rival to TikTok. Twitter offered to but ShareChat for $1.1B and had committed an additional investment of $900M. Twitter had expressed intention to take Moj, a short-form video app that ShareChat owns with 80M users, to international markets and position it as a rival to Chinese app TikTok.
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Google and Snap in Talks To Invest in India's ShareChat
TECH CRUNCH - Jan 5 - ShareChat, a Bangalore-based social network that added Twitter as an investor in 2019, is in advanced stages of talks to raise money from Google and Snap, as well as several existing investors, including Twitter, three sources familiar with the matter. ShareChat has raised about $264 million to date and was valued at nearly $700 million last year. Ankush Sachdeva, co-founder, and chief executive of ShareChat, said the app was growing "exponentially" and that users were spending, on average, ~30 mins on the app each day. If the deal goes through, it would be the first investment from Snapchat's parent company into an Indian startup.
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ShareChat Raises $40M
OUTLOOK INDIA - Sep 24 - Indian social networking platform ShareChat has raised $40M. The company, which has raised $264M in funding till date including this round, did not disclose the valuation at which the latest funds were raised. ShareChat CEO and co-founder Ankush Sachdeva said: "Our short-video platform Moj has been on an explosive growth trajectory since its launch. This funding will help us further invest in our product development." Moj debuted on Play Store on July 1, two days after the Indian government had banned 59 apps with Chinese linkages, including TikTok. Homegrown apps like Roposo, Chingari and Josh (Dailyhunt) have also seen significant growth in downloads and user signups. ShareChat and Moj together have ~240M MAUs (monthly active users).
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