Domestic short video platform Chingari has secured approximately US$ 1M in seed funding in July 2020 from AngelList, a US-based online stage for startups, angel investors and job-aspirants looking to work in startups.
Various sources reported that Chingari was also negotiating with venture capital firm Tiger Global for this round, but the deal flamed out.
About the Indian startup
Chingari is a Bengaluru based start-up that allows users to make short videos with popular music and various other trendy features. It began under the incubation of Sumit Ghosh’s IT consultancy firm Globussoft (Sumit Ghosh is the Co-founder of Chingari). The app was built by two developers Biswatma Nayak and Siddharth Gautam and other fellow members of Globussoft which included Ghosh. It launched in November 2018 on Google Play Store and January 2019 on iOS.
On 29 June 2020, the Government of India banned 60 Chinese apps including the most popular app on social media, TikTok. Following the ban, Chingari saw a massive rise in its user base and the platform decided to register two separate units, Tech4Billion Pvt Ltd and Chingari Media Pvt Ltd. Tech4Billion, the parent unit will be raising funds, whereas Chingari Media will be an entirely-owned subsidiary of Tech4Billion to run the main business. Ghosh and Nayak are the cofounders of these new units. Ghosh was quoted to have said that, “Right after the ban announcement, the platform experienced 500K – 600K new downloads for the whole next day. The servers started cracking, the backend infra was going crazy, and we had to shut a lot of APIs down.” Chingari has recorded more than 23M downloads in the month since the ban.
On July 1, Chingari was the top-most trending social media app on Google Play Store. Incorporating TikTok-like creation tools except for AR (Augmented Reality) filters, which are in the midst of development, has been a key factor in this triumph. Chingari also gives its users a platform where one can read local and international news, check the weather forecast of their city, play games, participate in quizzes and win prizes. The company has not yet planned a monetization model for Chingari but is looking to add that soon. A rewards campaign for creators of viral videos is also being run by the company.
The company has many rivals including Mitron, ShareChat’s Moj, Trell, Josh, Roposo, Gaana’s HotShots, and Zee5’s soon-to-be-launched HiPi. It is to be seen how Chingari will compete against these short video streaming platforms and maintain its foothold in the Indian market.
