In a significant crackdown on fraudulent market consultants and investment gurus, or “furus”, Meta has required advertiser authentication for all securities and investment-related advertisements that target Indian consumers beginning on July 31.
All advertisers running investment ads in India, including international campaigns targeting Indian audiences, must confirm the person or entity benefiting from and paying for the ad by providing valid SEBI registration details, according to updated terms of service announced on June 26 by Meta.
This comprises the name of the company, its SEBI registration number, and its registered phone number and email address. For authentication, Meta will supply the specified contact with a verification code.
Along with unique disclaimers made during ad setting, the SEBI registration number, organisation name, and location would be shown publicly on the advertisement as payer and beneficiary.
Advertisers to Get One Month to Complete Verification
According to Meta, advertising professionals will have at least a month to finish the screening procedure, and by July 28, the feature should be completely operational.
As long as the advertiser account is validated, ads that were active before July 31 do not require editing. In an effort to improve transparency and prevent fraud by dishonest influencers, the capital market regulator partnered with digital platforms to verify financial advisors earlier this year after much consideration and a thorough consultation process.
Meta has established alternative verification mechanisms for individuals who seek exemption from regulator registration, such as financial instructors or trainers.
Organisations must upload pertinent business documents, and individuals must present at least one government-issued ID. The advertisements will continue to reveal the confirmed identity.
Ads that Don’t Require Verification
Ads pertaining to training, talent development, or financial education might not need SEBI verification, Meta explained. Cyber law expert counsel (Dr) Prashant Mali said that Meta’s verification of SEBI credentials was long overdue and that Google should do the same for its YouTube channel.
In actuality, META and Google, with SEBI’s assistance, must immediately eliminate all prior shorts, reels, and videos that violate SEBI regulations and ultimately mislead investors. This verification was something that Dr Mali was always pushing for.
The action comes after a news release issued by SEBI on March 21 requesting that all intermediaries registered with the agency that advertise on social media platforms submit their verified contact information with the agency.
A surge in securities-related scams on websites like YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, X (formerly Twitter), Telegram, Google Play Store, and Apple App Store was noted by the regulator.
According to Meta, the policy’s objectives are to improve customer safety, stop fraud and impersonation, and maybe expand such regulations to other financial product categories in the future.
The WhatsApp advertising that the Meta-owned messaging firm has formally unveiled won’t appear in users’ calls or chats, so don’t worry. Instead of showing up in users’ personal area, these advertisements will show up in the Updates tab.
The Updates page, where one may view WhatsApp Status posts, is where Meta is placing them. Therefore, no, consumers’ private discussions are not being interrupted by advertisements for shoes or shampoo. These sponsored posts, such as Instagram Stories with occasional promotions, will appear between friends’ status updates.
In an official blog post, WhatsApp stated that these new features will only be available on the Updates page, separate from your private conversations. This implies that a user’s experience remains unchanged if he or she solely uses WhatsApp to communicate with friends and family.
Move Focuses on Monetising the Most Popular Messaging Space
WhatsApp did not just adopt this notion without any prior planning. Since acquiring WhatsApp, Meta has considered monetising the app and introducing advertisements to make money.
Meta always had a distinct idea, even though WhatsApp’s initial creators opposed the messaging service’s use of advertisements. In 2020, they postponed their advertising goals, but they have since returned with a strategy that says it respects your privacy.
In 2023, WhatsApp CEO Will Cathcart stated that the business was still figuring out how to include advertisements in the app without interfering with messages. We now understand how. The Updates tab’s hidden Status function will display these sponsored posts.
Ads will not Hinder Users’ Privacy
According to Meta, there will be limited ad targeting. Users’ locality or region, the language their app uses, the channels they follow, and how they interact with ads in Meta apps are just a few of the variables that will affect the ads.
It is advised to wait a while, pay great attention to the update, and then make any decisions regarding the company’s privacy policy. The company underlines that it does not read users’ messages or listen in on their calls in order to protect users’ privacy.
In addition to advertisements, Meta is launching channel subscriptions and promoted channels on the platform. Users will now see promoted channels when they search for new ones to follow. For a monthly price, they can also subscribe to channels for “exclusive updates”.
Sandhya Devanathan, the vice president of Meta’s India division at the time, stated in February that WhatsApp’s corporate clients have up to now used Instagram to promote their brands.
According to Devanathan, who is currently VP of India and Southeast Asia at Meta, the company has enabled the Click To WhatsApp feature for companies that advertise on Instagram. This allows potential customers to connect with these companies on WhatsApp with just one click, completing their sales cycles.
Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by Facebook.
In the world of digitalisation, there are only a handful of people who are not on this social media platform, Facebook. Although the company, Facebook, began as a social network for particular college students, it has now evolved into an important tool for day-to-day socialising and business professionals.
As a small company owner, Facebook may be precisely what you need to find potential workers, get new clients, or see what your competitors are up to. And doing so – browsing content on Facebook– does not need creating your new Facebook profile.
Facebook is an American online social networking website owned by Meta Platforms. Mark Zuckerberg, along with other three Harvard University undergraduates, launched Facebook in 2004. Facebook is free to use, yet ads on the platform provider for the bulk of the gross profitability. Members may establish accounts, upload photos, join established communities, or start their own.
Facebook’s popularity stems in part from creator Mark Zuckerberg’s insistence from the beginning that members be truthful regarding who they really are, as phoney pages are just not permitted.
According to the company’s business, transparency is necessary for developing interpersonal relationships, exchanging information and recommendations, and strengthening society as a whole. It also noted that the bottom-up, peer-to-peer networking of Facebook users makes it easier for businesses to connect with customers about their services and goods.
Know more about the Meta-owned company, Facebook, and how it is helpful to us, its business model, startup story, and much more by reading this article further.
Facebook – Company Highlights
Startup Name
Facebook
Parent
Meta Platforms (formerly known as Facebook, Inc)
Headquarters
Menlo Park, CA
Industry
Social Media Platform
Founders
Mark Zuckerberg, Andrew McCollum, Chris Hughes, Dustin Moskovitz, and Eduardo Saverin.
Facebook, a US-based online social media and social networking website is owned by Meta Platforms. The site’s features include Timeline or wall, a section on the user’s homepage where users can post content and friends can send messages, Status, which allows users to notify friends of their current location or set of circumstances, and News Feed, which notifies users of changes to their friends’ statuses and profiles.
Through Facebook, the users can communicate with one another and send and receive messages. Besides, they can also signal their approval for posts and comments on Facebook using the Like button, which can also be seen on many other websites.
In 2006, Facebook allowed anybody above the age of 13 to join, expanding its enrolment beyond students. Advertisers were able to develop new and successful consumer connections, just as Zuckerberg expected.
In October 2021, Facebook announced that its parent business will be renamed Meta Platforms. The name change signalled a shift in focus to the “metaverse,” an augmented reality realm in which people would participate. The Meta Platform now includes Facebook, the social networking platform.
Facebook – Industry
Customers can engage, produce, and share material and information through the social media market, which is made up of sales by entities (organizations, single traders, or partnerships). Social media platform users can exchange photos, videos, and audio clips.
This market generates revenue from advertising sales and other services provided through social networks. Advertising on social media and social media subscriptions are two different segments of the social media business.
The worldwide social media industry is predicted to increase at an annual pace (CAGR) of 39.7% from $159.68 billion in 2021 to $223.11 billion in 2022.
Businesses are reforming their operations and recovering from the effects of COVID-19, which had previously culminated in restrictive measures such as social distancing, the closure of commercial firms, and remote work, all of which caused operational challenges. Growing at a CAGR of 39%, the market is estimated to reach $833.50 billion in 2026.
With 46% of the global social media market in 2020, Asia Pacific was the most important region. The 2nd-largest area, North America, accounted for 32% of the worldwide market. Africa was identified as the fastest-growing region in the social media market between 2020-2021.
Facebook – Name, Logo, and Tagline
Facebook Logo
According to David Kirkpatrick’s book The Facebook Effect, the name Facebook was picked because every Harvard student was given one of these, which held images of their classmates and were referred to as Facebook.
A majority of the American university students received face book directories, which consisted of individuals’ names and photos and were distributed among the university students to help them know each other. This is where the name “Facebook” came from, the sole aim of which is to connect people with their friends and family via its social media platform. The small F sign on Facebook’s site is considered to represent the name Facebook.
Facebook’s tagline used to be, “It’s Free and Always Will be” which was changed to, “It’s Quick and Easy.” It was changed silently between 6th and 7th August 2019, and Facebook didn’t clarify the reason why.
Facebook – Founders and Team
Facebook was founded by Mark Zuckerberg, Andrew McCollum, Chris Hughes, Dustin Moskovitz, and Eduardo Saverin.
Co-founder and current CEO of Facebook – Mark Zuckerberg
Mark Zuckerberg
Mark Zuckerberg is an American businessman, media personality, and philanthropist. He is best known as the co-founder of Meta Platforms, Inc. (previously called Facebook, Inc.), where he currently serves as chairman, CEO, and dominant shareholder. He is also a co-founder and board member of Breakthrough Starshot, a solar sail spacecraft development initiative.
Andrew McCollum
Andrew McCollum joined Philo, an entertainment-focused OTT streaming service, as CEO in 2014. Philo debuted countrywide in November 2017. Andrew was on Philo’s board of directors, supervised the company’s co-founders, and was one of the company’s early investors before becoming CEO.
Andrew was a member of the founding team of Facebook before joining Philo, and he has a long-standing interest in the social design of products. Following Facebook, Andrew worked as an Entrepreneur in Residence at New Enterprise Associates (NEA) and Flybridge Partners, two of Philo’s investors. He is still an active angel investor and counsellor in the early stages of a company’s development.
Chris Hughes
Chris Hughes (November 26, 1983) is an American entrepreneur who co-founded and served as spokesperson for the online social networking and directory site Facebook with his Harvard companions. He was the editor-in-chief and publisher of The New Republic from 2012 until 2016. As of 2019, Hughes is a co-chair of the Economic Security Project.
Dustin Moskovitz
Dustin Moskovitz is the CEO and Co-Founder of Asana. He co-founded Good Ventures and the Open Philanthropy Project. He is also one of the co-founders of Facebook.
Eduardo Saverin
Eduardo Saverin is a B Capital Group co-founder and partner. Saverin is a co-founder of Facebook and the initial investor. Saverin is eager to put money into the next wave of technical developments. He has counselled and worked closely with an array of firms of different kinds and stages as a technology investor and supervisor, all of which share one consistent theme: a love for people-centric technology, as well as a mobile platform lean with pan-global ambitions.
The Facebook team last registered 71,970 full-time employees in December 2021.
Facebook – Startup Story
Facebook, a social networking website, was established on October 28, 2003, as “FaceMash” before rebranding as “The Facebook” on February 4, 2004. It was established by Mark Zuckerberg and his Harvard University classmates. The website’s designers initially limited membership to Harvard students.
Nonetheless, it was gradually expanded to include additional Boston-area colleges, the Ivy League, and finally most universities in the United States and Canada, businesses, and, by September 2006, everyone over the age of 13 with a valid email account.
In September 2004, the Wall was added to a Facebook user’s online profile. This widely used feature allowed a user’s friends to post information to their Facebook wall, and it rapidly became an important part of the social aspect of the network. Facebook had gained one million active members by the end of 2004. However, the firm was still lagging behind Myspace, the top online social network at that time, with five million users. Nevertheless, in the long run, MySpace failed to compete against Facebook.
2005 was a momentous occasion for the company. It was then that the idea of “tagging” people in photographs posted to the site was born. Tags were used to identify themselves and others in photos that were viewable to other Facebook friends. Facebook users can upload an unlimited amount of photos but the facial recognition feature of Facebook, which tagged the persons on the photograph earlier, is not there anymore now.
Outside of the United States, high school and university students were allowed to join the ‘Facebook army’ in 2005. By the end of that year, it had six million monthly active users.
Facebook’s mission is to give people the power to build community and bring the world closer together.
Based on the company’s social media service offerings, Facebook’s corporate vision statement is “People use Facebook to stay connected with friends and family, discover what’s going on in the world, and share and express what matters to them.”
This corporate vision demonstrates that the company is more than just an online social networking service. Rather, the firm aids in the gathering of information and meaningful dialogue among individual customers.
Facebook – Business Model and Revenue Model
Facebook makes money largely through showing commercials from businesses on its Facebook and Instagram apps. Ads contributed to 98% of Facebook’s $86 billion revenue in 2020. The remaining 2% of profits came mostly from Oculus and Portal device sales, as well as development payment fees.
Facebook’s business strategy is centred on providing its products and technologies to billions of users for free and then generating money by enabling businesses to show advertisements to Facebook’s consumers. Advertisers pay Facebook auction-based pricing depending on supply and demand.
This implies that the individuals who consume Facebook’s services (users) aren’t the people who are paying for them. Small companies who advertise on Facebook’s collection of applications are the real clients. With the launch of Facebook Shops, the initial iteration of Facebook’s e-commerce capabilities, the company’s focus on small companies became much more obvious.
Notwithstanding its history and present problems, Facebook is doing incredibly well. Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, sales increased by 22% to $86 billion in 2020. It had a profit margin of 38% and a net income of $29 billion.
Facebook – Funding and Investors
Facebook raised a total of 16 funding rounds to date, as of July 12, 2022, which helped the organisation raise over $16 bn. Here’s a look at the Facebook funding table:
Date
Round
Amount
Lead Investors
Oct 20, 2014
Post-IPO-Equity
$13.8B
–
May 10, 2011
Secondary Market
–
–
Mar 4, 2011
Private Equity Round
–
–
Jan 21, 2011
Private Equity Round
$1.5B
DST Global, Goldman Sachs Investment Partners
Jan 1, 2011
Secondary Market
–
–
Jun 28, 2010
Secondary Market
$120M
Elevation Partners
May 26, 2009
Series D
$200M
DST Global
May 1, 2008
Debt Financing
$100M
TriplePoint Capital
Mar 27, 2008
Series C
$60M
Horizons Ventures
Jan 15, 2008
Series C
$15M
Global Founders Capital
The Facebook investors include Elevation Partners, DST Global, Horizons Ventures, Goldman Sachs Investment Partners and more.
Facebook – Investments
Facebook has made 44+ investments in total to date, as of July 12, 2022. Here’s diving into the most recent Facebook investments:
Date
Organization Name
Round
Amount
May 27, 2022
OlaClick (YC W21)
Seed Round
$4.4M
May 4, 2022
Ami
Seed Round
$3M
April 6, 2022
VerSe Innovation
Series J
$805M
Jan 1, 2022
PlayCo
Corporate Round
$40M
Nov 8, 2021
Inworld AI
Seed Round
$7M
Oct 5, 2021
echo3D
Series A
$4M
Sep 30, 2021
Meesho
Series F
$570M
Aug 3, 2021
Formaloo
Grant
–
Jul 5, 2021
Helpmum
Grant
$55K
May 3, 2021
Obviously AI
Seed Round
$3.7M
Apr 5, 2021
Meesho
Series E
$300M
Jan 1, 2021
FEMCA Financial Services
Pre-Seed Round
–
Dec 24, 2020
ArtyOwl.com
Grant
₹100K
Dec 4, 2020
Com Olho
Grant
–
Facebook – Acquisitions
Facebook has acquired a total of 95+ companies to date. The last acquisition of Facebook is presize.ai, which the company acquired on April 14, 2022.
Here’s a look at some of the recently acquired companies of Facebook:
Acquiree Name
About Acquiree
Date
Amount
presize.ai
Presize is a Germany-based company that is fuelled by the Computer Vision and Deep Learning technologies to develop the most accurate body scanning software
Apr 14, 2022
–
ImagineOptix
ImagineOptix is a US-based company that manufactures optical thin films to help the production of small, affordable, battery-efficient video projectors
Dec 21, 2021
–
Within (VR/AR)
Within is a virtual reality and augmented reality media and technology company.
Oct 29, 2021
–
AI.Reverie
A leading provider of synthetic data to train machine learning algorithms.
Oct 12, 2021
–
Unit 2 Games
Unit 2 Games is a game creation and sharing platform designed to develop video games
Jun 4, 2021
–
Kustomer
Kustomer is an omnichannel Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) CRM platform specializing in customer service
Nov 30, 2020
$1B
Lemnis Technologies
We set a new standard for visual fidelity in VR/AR head-mounted displays, opening new opportunities for professional users.
Sep 22, 2020
–
Mapillary
Mapillary has built a street-level imagery platform that uses photos which have been uploaded by members of the public.
Jun 18, 2020
–
Giphy
Giphy is an online database and search engine that allows users to search, share, and discover GIFs.
May 15, 2020
$400M
Sanzaru Games
Sanzaru Games is an independent console video game development studio.
Feb 25, 2020
–
Scape Technologies
Scape is a computer vision startup, building the localization engine for city-scale augmented reality.
Feb 9, 2020
–
Packagd
Packagd is a series of app that offers new mobile shopping experience.
Dec 20, 2019
–
Facebook – Growth
Facebook is the most popular social media network in the world, with 2.91 billion active monthly users as of the fourth quarter of 2021, which went up to become 2.93 bn in Q1 of FY22. Here’s a look at the rise of Facebook’s monthly active users.
Facebook’s Growth of Monthly Active Users
The number of registered Facebook members topped 1 billion in the third quarter of 2012, making it the first social networking service to accomplish so. In the first quarter of 2021, the company said that 3.51 billion people used at least one of its key platforms on a monthly basis (Facebook, Whatsapp, Messenger, or Instagram).
Facebook initially began with only 150 people working with the same firm back in 2006. This rose and rose over the years, and was last registered with 71,970 full-time employees in December 2021.
What’s Facebook Changing to Ramp up Growth?
Facebook and Instagram both will see some changes, and many of these changes will be inclined towards altering the process of how Facebook and Instagram users share posts and videos. On this, Mark Zuckerberg announced that the platforms will make it easier for the users to control what they “see and discover on Facebook.” Here are some of the proposed changes that will take place:
Feeds will be introduced as a new tab. This will help the users see the most recent posts from their friends, groups, and Pages.
A Favourites list can be curated of the friends and Pages the users care about.
The first thing that the users will now see is Home.
According to Bloomberg, Facebook is on a mission to change the way it shows its users’ posts and videos in order to enable the users to watch content from accounts that they don’t already follow. This will, thus, help the Meta flagship product, Facebook to better compete with viral video app TikTok.
Facebook’s Annual Revenue :
Year
Revenue
2010
$1.97 billion
2011
$3.71 billion
2012
$5.08 billion
2013
$7.87 billion
2014
$12.4 billion
2015
$17.9 billion
2016
$27.6 billion
2017
$40.6 billion
2018
$55.8 billion
2019
$70.6 billion
2020
$85.9 billion
The revenue of Fb in Q3 2021 was registered at $29.01 bn, which included $28.27 bn in ad revenues and $734 mn worth of other revenue.
Facebook Begins Testing Ethereum and Polygon NFTs on Profiles
Facebook announced that it has already started rolling out NFTs for some of the American creators in a report dated July 1, 2022. A spokesperson of the social media giant mentioned that the platform has started initially with NFTs on Ethereum and Polygon and will eventually add support for NFTs on Solana and Flow as well.
According to a post by Meta Product Manager Navdeep Singh, the users’ Facebook profiles will have a “digital collectibles area”, where they can display their NFTs, which are special blockchain tokens representing ownership. Singh also mentioned that the users will also be able to link their Facebook profiles to their bitcoin wallets. Also, they will have the option to convert their NFTs into Facebook posts that may then be shared, liked, commented on, and responded to, just like any other Facebook post.
Here’s the first look shared by Navdeep:
Facebook NFTs
Face Recognition Shutdown
Face recognition will be phased out of Facebook’s social network, as announced by the company in November 2021. Its use will be limited across all products, and over a billion saved faces will be deleted, according to Meta, Facebook’s newly formed parent company.
According to a blog post by Meta’s VP of artificial intelligence, Jerome Pesenti, the action will destroy over a billion saved faces in the following weeks. The removal of such a large database signal that Meta would limit the use of facial recognition in its planned “metaverse” projects, which will involve actual people interacting in vast virtual settings, including game environments, at least initially.
“The many specific instances where facial recognition can be helpful need to be weighed against growing concerns about the use of this technology as a whole,” wrote Pesenti. “There are many concerns about the place of facial recognition technology in society, and regulators are still in the process of providing a clear set of rules governing its use,” he said. “Amid this ongoing uncertainty, we believe that limiting the use of facial recognition to a narrow set of use cases is appropriate.”
Facebook – Competitors
The top competitors of Facebook are technology giants like:
The prominence and magnitude of Facebook have prompted condemnation from a variety of quarters. Internet privacy, its face recognition software, excessive data retention, DeepFace’s addictive nature, and its function in the workplace, including access to employee accounts by employers, are all challenges.
Facebook has been chastised for its consumption of electricity, tax evasion, real-name user verification regulations, censorship, and participation in the US PRISM surveillance program.
Users of Facebook are said to have negative psychological impacts such as jealousy and tension, a lack of focus, and social media addiction. Facebook has been slammed for enabling users to post obscene or illegal content. Copyright and intellectual property infringement, hate speech, rape, terrorist incitement, fake news, crimes, murders, and live-streaming violent situations are among the specifics.
Sri Lanka suspended both WhatsApp and Facebook in May 2019 as a temporary fix to restore peace following anti-Muslim violence, the worst in the country since the Easter Sunday attack the preceding year. Between the fourth quarter of 2018 and the first quarter of 2019, Facebook removed 3 billion fake accounts, bringing the total number of monthly active users to 2.39 billion.
The company said in late July 2019 that the Federal Trade Commission was investigating it for antitrust breaches.
Facebook Layoffs
Facebook is looking to lay off employees and has already asked the process managers to identify the low-performing employees and move them to exit, as per reports dated July 15, 2022. The company has been reportedly struggling with macroeconomic pressures and incurred hits to its advertising business.
Facebook Parent Meta Faces Trademark Lawsuit
Meta Platforms Inc., the parent company of Facebook has been hit by a trademark lawsuit filed by Meta X LLC., a virtual reality-based company, in Manhattan federal court, as of the reports dated July 26, 2022. MetaX alleged that the Facebook owner (earlier Facebook, Inc.), which is now renamed Meta Platforms Inc., has stolen its name since its pivot to metaverse. MetaX also reported that Meta has infringed its federal “Meta” trademarks.
Following the renaming of Facebook as ‘Meta,’ the firm will be “metaverse first,” according to CEO Mark Zuckerberg, which means you won’t need a Facebook account to access other Meta products in the future.
“I’ve been thinking a lot about our identity as we begin this next chapter,” he said. “Facebook is an iconic social media brand, but it just doesn’t encompass everything that we do.”
It also suggests that the company would divide its activities into two segments: one for its future platform efforts (Reality Labs is going to be the tag for that segment) and another for its app family.
Whilst expanding their social networking applications will remain a priority, he believes that the company’s identity will become less tied to a single product/ service over time.
In short, the metaverse will be an embodiment of the internet, according to Zuckerberg, who believes it will be the next integrated virtual media to emerge after video (which evolved from photos and texts).
Rather than staring at a screen, you’ll be able to immerse yourself in these activities. That’s most probably to be accomplished through instilling a strong sense of presence in a shared environment, which would be the metaverse’s distinguishing characteristic. This will demand hardware from the firm, such as the Oculus Quest 2 or others.
The firm is thinking about offering incentives to developers and new users to join. To boost adoption, these alternatives include cutting costs, subsidizing gadgets, or selling them at a loss.
It’s crucial to stress, though, that the metaverse of Zuckerberg’s visions is far from complete. Currently, just the fundamental building pieces work, according to Zuckerberg. In the end, technological obstacles remain—compressing augmented reality technology and sophisticated computers into a pair of spectacles, for example, is a difficult task.
Although Zuckerberg vows to encourage security and privacy on this new “social technology” network in a founder’s letter, it remains to be seen if he can persuade people to use it, particularly younger generations who have been abandoning Facebook. Many people question if a new interface would simply reintroduce the same old issues.
FAQs
What does Facebook do?
Facebook is an American online social networking website owned by Meta Platforms.
Who founded Facebook?
Facebook was founded by Mark Zuckerberg, Andrew McCollum, Chris Hughes, Dustin Moskovitz, and Eduardo Saverin.
When was Facebook founded?
Facebook was founded in the year 2004.
How does Facebook make money?
Facebook makes money primarily by showing advertisements from businesses on its Instagram and Facebook apps.
Which companies do Facebook compete with?
The top 10 competitors in Facebook’s competitive set are:
Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by WhatsApp.
“No advertisements! “No tricks! No games! ” — A basic premise that enabled a simple messaging service to defeat behemoths like Facebook Messenger, iMessage, WeChat, Snapchat, Kik Messenger, Line, etc., and others despite having only 50 employees.
Whatsapp’s journey is unlike any other renowned startup tale, in which the founders generated the idea, formed a team, dropped out of college, and received pre-seed capital from a behemoth like Facebook or Google. WhatsApp was created by folks in their thirties who had decent full-time jobs with reputable brand names.
This internet messaging app was created to meet a legitimate need (empowering mobile-based conversations), and it was able to leverage practically every increasing trend, such as push alerts, as well as a necessity, such as encryption.
Today, more than a decade has passed since the company was founded, and still the firm makes millions of dollars while adhering to its no ads, no games, and no tricks principles. Know more about Whatsapp’s success story, its business model, founders, revenue model, funding and more.
WhatsApp – Company Highlights
Startup Name
WhatsApp
Parent Company
Meta
Also Known As
WhatsApp Ireland Limited
Legal Name
WhatsApp Inc.
Industry
Instant Messaging, Subscription Service
Headquarter
San Francisco Bay Area, Silicon Valley, West Coast
WhatsApp Messenger, or just WhatsApp, is a Meta-owned free, cross-platform centralised instant messaging and voice-over-IP service which is available worldwide. Users may exchange text and voice messages, initiate audio and video chats, and exchange photographs, user locations (even live locations), document files, and any other stuff using the app. WhatsApp’s client application is available on both mobile devices and desktop PCs. To use the service, you must have a cellular phone number to sign up for the service.
WhatsApp’s key differentiator is that the application makes it feasible to send and receive messages and calls with the prerequisite of just an active internet connection, making it essentially free to use and great for phone calls, and even international calling. We don’t have to worry about data plan limits or go through any sign-up costs for using WhatsApp.
While there are several messaging applications which can be compared to WhatsApp, it has a few distinct characteristics, the most essential of which is WhatsApp’s cross-platform capabilities.
At once, WhatsApp may appear to be nothing more than a text messaging service, but it is capable of so much more. And here is an overview of WhatsApp’s most significant characteristics:
End-to-end encryption, a secure communication technology in which only the parties who are chatting may receive the messages, is used by WhatsApp.
You may record and send voice messages to one person or group conversations using voice messaging.
WhatsApp enables video calls in addition to voice conversations, including a group mode that allows up to eight people to be on the same call.
Rather than using email or other document-sharing applications, WhatsApp allows you to share various types of documents, including spreadsheets, PDFs, and slideshows.
You can share photos, videos, stickers, and GIFs without stressing about them being distorted or not being downloaded, as may happen when sending SMS messages across various mobile systems and cellular providers.
WhatsApp has a desktop version available for both Mac and PC.
WhatsApp’s specialized business account lets businesses to promote their products and services, and communicate with consumers on a handy and user-friendly platform.
You’ll need to download the app on your Android phone or iPhone and register an account before you can use WhatsApp. You’ll see that you’ll require your phone number to set up an account after installing the application.
WhatsApp, unlike several other services, does not employ unique usernames. Rather, WhatsApp uses a number to identify users. This means that everyone who uses WhatsApp will be included in your list of contacts immediately, making setting up very simple.
Once you’re fully operational, familiarise yourself with WhatsApp’s capabilities, which range from making international calls to sending audio messages to many many services as written above.
Instant messaging is a sort of internet chat that allows users to send texts in real-time online or using another computer network. Messages are usually sent across 2 or more parties when each user enters text and sends it to the recipient(s), who are all connected to the same network.
Instant messaging varies from email in that interactions take place in real-time or instantly. Most current instant messaging apps employ push technology and include additional features such as emojis, file sharing, bots, Voice over IP, or video chat.
One of the primary reasons businesses are gravitating towards mobile texting is that it saves a lot of time while maintaining a high level of customer service. The explanation for this is straightforward. Customer service over the telephone or in-person are both synchronized activities that need both sides to participate at the same time. You’re working with one individual once they’re ready to end the engagement, and there’s nothing you can do but assist them. Email is asynchronous, meaning it is sent by one individual and read and responded to by another. You can help a lot of people in a short amount of time, but your response may come long after the desire to read has passed.
For most parts of the world, mobile texting is limited to Facebook and WhatsApp. Over 2.5 billion individuals use one of these two platforms, and in some areas, the two applications account for over 90% of the market. Because of Facebook’s (Now Meta) popularity, rival messaging groups have sprung up that appear to be the polar opposite of Facebook. Both Telegram and Signal were formed on strong pro-encryption principles, and they constantly criticise Facebook for commercialising communications.
WhatsApp is the most widely used messaging app in the world, with over 150 million users. Both Viber and Telegram have gained popularity in particular nations and areas, including the Middle East, Africa, and South America. In 2021, WhatsApp had the most downloads, however, its overall downloads were down in the year, 2020.
The domination of Facebook and WhatsApp is even more obvious in India, where these two applications account for 92 per cent of all engagements. Telegram and Signal penetration have not made much of a difference in total sessions, despite skyrocketing usage after WhatsApp’s privacy change.
In 2009, former Yahoo employees, Jan Koum and Brian Acton launched WhatsApp.
Founders of WhatsApp – Jan Koum, Brian Acton
Jan Koum
Jan Koum, WhatsApp’s co-founder and former CEO, is in charge of setting WhatsApp’s general direction and strategy. Jan is also responsible for designing and interface of WhatsApp’s platform, as well as the development of its underlying technology and infrastructure, with his co-founder Brian Acton. Jan moved to California in 1992, from his hometown in Ukraine. Here, in California, he attended San Jose State University but eventually dropped out from there.
Brian Acton
Brian Acton, Signal Technology Foundation’s Founder and Executive Chairman, is also the co-founder of WhatsApp. Brian serves as a software developer. He’s also a Silicon Valley expert, experienced working at Adobe, Apple, and Yahoo before joining WhatsApp. Brian co-founded WhatsApp in 2009 and helped it grow to over a billion users globally. Brian is a Central Florida native with a BS in Computer Science from Stanford University.
WhatsApp – Startup Story
Jan Koum, the co-founder of WhatsApp, bought an iPhone in January 2009 and immediately recognised the opportunities and prospects of the app market on the App Store, which was just a few months old at the time. He wanted to make an app that showed users’ current state besides their names.
They went to Alex Fishman for more information after discussing the proposal with Acton. However, without the assistance of an iOS developer, this concept could not be realised. As a result, Alex recommended them to Igor Solomennikov, a Russian developer whom he discovered on RentACoder.com.
The road to success was not easy at first, but they persevered, as have many other great businesses. On February 24, 2009, Koum successfully developed the iOS application and established ‘WhatsApp Inc.’ in California.
He chose the name ‘WhatsApp’ because it sounded very much like what’s up, which corresponded to the concept of statuses.
He showed the app to some friends, including Fisherman, but none of them liked it. Additionally, difficulties such as app crashing, battery draining, and other issues left Koum so unhappy that he lost all faith and began looking for new employment.
Apple released the push notifications upgrade in June 2009. This update was created to notify users even when they’re not operating an installed application. Jan took advantage of this shift and tweaked Whatsapp so that it sends push alerts to contacts anytime a user modified his status on the service.
Fishman’s Russian pals found it amusing and began using it to keep track of their own whereabouts and contact each other with updates like “I woke late” or “Can’t chat, I’m at the office.”
This function quickly became a conduit for instant text messaging, and users began communicating with one another through status updates, such as someone posting “What’s up Jack?” and Jack responding by altering her status.
“Being able to reach somebody halfway across the world instantly, on a device that is always with you, was powerful,” – Jan Koum
WhatsApp 2.0 was released in beta shortly after recognizing the need for an instant messaging service. People were enchanted by the possibility of registering and signing in with merely a phone number and they were able to send messages to friends through the internet rather than through operators’ SMS plans, all of it for no extra cost.
WhatsApp’s mission statement says, “Behind every product, the decision is our desire to let people communicate anywhere in the world without barriers.”
The vision of Whatsapp set by mark Zuckerberg is “WhatsApp on a path to connecting more than a billion people.”
WhatsApp’s mission statement explains why the company was founded and what has kept it going since its inception.
WhatsApp – WhatsApp Business
WhatsApp verified claims that they were developing and evaluating 2 additional business tools in September 2017. The applications were released in January 2018, with different target audiences:
Small businesses may use WhatsApp Business.
An Enterprise Solution enabling larger enterprises with international client bases, such as e-commerce shops, airlines, and banks, to provide customer care and conversational commerce (e-commerce) over WhatsApp chat utilising live agents or chatbots.
In October 2020, Facebook announced the introduction of per-message price levels for services delivered through the WhatsApp Business API.
WhatsApp – Business Model
WhatsApp generates revenue by charging large and medium businesses for use of its Business Application programming interface. But, before we go any further, have a glance at the company’s prior monetization initiatives.
Previously, WhatsApp used to monetize its users through subscriptions. Users have to pay $1 each year to use the app. Given WhatsApp’s 2 billion users, that would yield a $2 billion income rate of economic growth.
Facebook dropped the $1 charge two years after the purchase, in 2016. The underlying aim was to keep focused on user growth and assist WhatsApp in becoming the undisputed messaging leader.
That means scrapping any plans to include advertisements in the product. While Facebook’s Messenger app has in-app advertising, the company’s management has chosen to engage with companies to monetise WhatsApp.
WhatsApp introduced its Business API in 2018, marking the company’s first sustained effort to commercialise the programme after its purchase.
Small businesses can utilise the B2B service for free. Larger firms, on the other hand, must pay every time they send a response 24 hours after the first message was delivered. Everything after the 24-hour mark will cost between $0.05 and $0.90 for each message responded.
WhatsApp also collaborates with other companies to supply its API, such as the cloud communication platform Twilio.
WhatsApp – Funding, and Investors
Date
Round
Amount
Lead Investors
Jul 1, 2013
Series B
$52M
Sequoia Capital
Apr 8, 2011
Series A
$8M
Sequoia Capital
Oct 1, 2009
Seed Round
$250K
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WhatsApp – Competitors
WhatsApp’s competitors are iMessage (1.3 billion active users), Telegram (500 million active users), Viber (260 million active users), WeChat (1.2 billion active users), Signal (over 50 million active users), and LINE (217 million active users). During WhatsApp disruptions and scandals, both Telegram and Signal have experienced signup increases.
WhatsApp is developing additional capabilities for its smartphone and desktop users. This time, the Facebook-backed messaging app is putting a new version of message responses through its paces in preparation for a future WhatsApp beta update for Android handsets. New upgrades and features for iOS and Desktop users are also being tested.
In a recent update, WhatsApp introduced a new plus icon to the reply bar: after touching it, the user will be able to give a reaction to the message by selecting a different emoji.
WhatsApp plans to release a few additional features in the near future. They are providing an option in their versions up to 2.22.3.5 where users will be able to sketch using pens and pencils. The business intends to introduce a variety of pencils that will allow you to sketch on your photos and videos.
Another potential is a function that allows users to blur their photos. This blur photos feature was previously only accessible on WhatsApp for iOS, but now it is being rumoured that it may be accessible for WhatsApp Beta testing on Android phones as well.
The new “Profile Picture” under the message notice is another improvement that we’ve heard is coming shortly. In prior versions, when someone got a new text message, they could simply see the sender’s name. However, they will now be able to see their profile picture next to their name, which is nice since you will know who has contacted you.
WhatsApp is now used by over 1.5 billion individuals in 180 countries. The software has already replaced SMS, MMS, and other outdated communication methods that its target market previously employed. And now, with Facebook’s ambition of bringing companies on board, cell carriers’ features may become utterly obsolete.
The business has also released a desktop version of the software (WhatsApp Web) to make it more convenient to use on a PC or Mac. Mark Zuckerberg is going all out to push WhatsApp to new heights in the corporate world. With several upgrades flowing out and people being blown away by its capabilities, the company will retain its position in the market.
WhatsApp – FAQs
What does WhatsApp do?
WhatsApp Messenger, or just WhatsApp, is a Meta-owned free, cross-platform centralised instant messaging and voice-over-IP service which is available worldwide.
Who founded WhatsApp?
In 2009, former Yahoo employees, Jan Koum and Brian Acton launched WhatsApp.
Which companies do WhatsApp compete with?
WhatsApp’s competitors are iMessage, Telegram, Viber, WeChat, Signal, and LINE.
When was WhatsApp launched?
In 2009, former Yahoo employees, Jan Koum and Brian Acton launched WhatsApp.
