WhatsApp completes a decade of operations: How it signed up 1.5 bn people

Business Standard WhatsApp completes a decade of operations: How it signed up 1.5 bn people

Co-founder Jan Koum's eastern European background, however, was the key to building WhatsApp, as he grew up in a communist country known for its secret policing activities

Companies News: As WhatsApp completes 10 years of operations, the Facebook-owned messaging service continues to be one of the most powerful platforms globally as well as in India.

This comes despite the messaging platform being embroiled in a slew of controversies in most of the countries it operates in.

WhatsApp, which has been able to hold its weight against Twitter, Google and Microsoft’s Skype, has about 1.5 billion users in 180 countries who find it easy to send messages across different countries and mobile devices.

“It’s been 10 years since we started WhatsApp! Over the past decade, we’ve heard from people across the globe who are using WhatsApp to stay in touch with their loved ones, connect with their communities, and build businesses,” said WhatsApp in a blog post. “We’re excited to continue building features that make WhatsApp even more simple and reliable for everyone,” it added.

Even Internet giant Google has not been able to create a platform such as WhatsApp. Last December, Google officially announced that it was shutting down its smart messaging app Allo.

Even though WhatsApp did not go for country-by-country launch to start with, the app was pretty much available in Google Play Store for all users, including those in India. However, its popularity in the country really picked up around 2010-11, especially as several of its early features were designed keeping Indian conditions in mind, given the choppy connectivity and existence of devices of different makes.

In fact, India was the first country where WhatsApp rolled out in-app video calling services in 2016, ahead of its global launch, underlining the importance of the market for the company. It launched payments through the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) for a select number of users last year, but has been awaiting regulatory clearance to launch the service formally...Read More