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PRATHAM
•

Medial • 6m

Hike To Strike: A failed Startup journey of " Hike Messenger" Hike: India's messaging app that went from "We'll beat WhatsApp!" to "What's up?" in no time. Born in 2012, raised $261M, valued at $1.4B by 2016 by investors like SoftBank and Tencent. Had 100M+ users who appeared to left their phones in 2021, lol. Reasons for failure: 1. Competitors like WhatsApp And Messenger 2. Frequent pivots 3. Inability to monetize effectively 4. Nothing Unique, just a rip off. 5. Their major USP was that it can have 1000 people in a group ( which is not so unique , lol ) 6. Lack of networking effect like how WhatsApp had before Lessons: 1. Lots of users doesn't mean money in the bank 2. Don't change your mind more than you change your aim 3. Figure out how to make money, or you'll be broke with your friends 4. To beat the big guys, be special , not just another fish in the sea. Best Example is ChatGPT This story demonstrates that not all well funded startups are successful.

5 replies18 likes

Replies (5)

Havish Gupta

Stealth • 6m

Network effect is what keeping all of us still using WhatsApp. Or else a lot many would have shifted to other apps (probobly signal)

1 replies1 like

PRATHAM
•

Medial • 6m

Notable mention which I didn't include: they also had stickers in their app which was not prevalent that time but they introduced it in the scene and it's another unique thing which they did but wasn't that unique to attract users and was eventually copied by everyone

0 replies1 like

Anonymous 1

Stealth • 6m

They were the pioneers in stickers, did you know that?

1 replies1 like

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Why did the Hike messenger fail in India? If anyone knows the reason please share it here.

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Whats so special about OTPless, like we had otp in whatsapp for so many years to verify accounts

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