Koo, the Indian microblogging platform created to rival X/Twitter is shutting down. The social media network gained popularity in 2021 when the Indian government was in a scuffle with X/Twitter over the non-removal of some content, with several ministers and departments of the Union government flocking to Koo.
In a recent post on LinkedIn, the company’s co-founder Mayank Bidawatka said that they were exploring partnerships with “multiple larger internet companies, conglomerates and media houses, but these talks didn’t yield the outcome” and that “a couple of them changed priority almost close to signing.”
The update came after a report by The Morning Context suggested that the deal between Koo and DailyHunt fell through. While the app did expand its presence in Brazil and logged over 1 million downloads in just 48 hours of launch, it struggled to gain traction in the Indian market.
The interface is similar to that of Twitter with the app letting users categorise their posts with hashtags and tag other users in mentions or replies. The social media network also frequently added new features like “Talk to Type” and even supported various Indian languages like Hindi, Telugu, Tamil, Bengali, Gujarati, Marathi, Assamese and Punjabi to name a few.
Several prominent Indian politicians like Piyush Goyal, Ravi Shankar Prasad, author Amish Tripathi, cricketer Anil Kumble and Javagal Srinath were some of the first personalities to sign up on Koo. It also managed to grab the attention of popular Brazilian celebrities like Babu Santana, Claudia Leitte and author Rosana Hermann
In 2022, the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises and Export Promotion Department, Government of Uttar Pradesh signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Koo to promote its “One District, One Product” initiative. the social media was also working with the Indian government on several projects.
Koo had managed to secure $60 million in funding from known investors like Tiger Global and Accel after it won the Atma-nirbhar App Innovation Challenge, a part of the Indian government’s “Make in India” initiative.
In April last year, the company fired around 30 per cent or around 300 of its total employees amid an increase in losses, declining active users and weak global sentiment.
