Indians who don't have TikTok have found more than 100 alternatives to TikTok

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India, a country full of miracles, is our friendly neighbor. However, this lovely neighbor has been causing troubles recently.

On the evening of June 29, the Indian Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology issued a "Chinese APP ban". Then on July 29 and September 2, the number of banned Chinese APPs was increased twice. As of now, a total of 165 Chinese APPs have been banned in India. This is how the magical story begins...

The magical event of a Chinese app with a large number of users being banned

Chinese apps going global have achieved remarkable results in the past few years. According to statistics from App Annie, Facebook ranked first in downloads of non-game apps in India in 2018, followed by Messenger and WhatsApp, and TikTok ranked only sixth. Only one year later, TikTok surpassed Facebook and became the most downloaded app. Huya's live streaming app Bigo Live and short video app Likee were also on the list.

The total number of users of the 59 Chinese apps in the first ban list in India alone exceeds 500 million. After the withdrawal of Chinese apps with a large number of users, the vast majority of Indian smartphone users will inevitably be affected, and it will also bring a huge market gap.

However, this blank did not last long. The poor Indians who did not have TikTok soon discovered that various kinds of "Tik Tok" appeared in the Indian market, such as TokTik, TikTik, Tik India, TkaTak, TakaTak... This style is very similar to the high-quality imitation products that appeared in our country when I was in school: such as "Master Kong" and "Master Tang", as well as "Qia Qia" and "Zhi Zhi"...

Of course, it is not just Tik Tok, there are also SHAREit alternatives such as ShareKaro, Share Go, Share AlI... These high-copy APPs not only have high-copy names and high-copy icons, but also have almost the same operation UI as the original APP. Due to the withdrawal of domestic APPs, the Indian app store is now crowded with copycat competitors.

The magical Indians and the unlucky Chinese APP

Shareit once had 400 million users in India, with 200 million monthly active users. After June 29, this number dropped to zero overnight, and Indian domestic apps, with the slogan of no ads and made in India, quickly divided up the market. These situations are very embarrassing for domestic manufacturers, because even if India lifts the ban in the future and Chinese apps can return to the Indian market, there are not only original competitors on the track, but also many local copycat apps.

Take TikTok as an example. According to incomplete statistics from some media, there were more than 100 TikTok copycat apps in the Google Play Store. A week after the ban was implemented, the download volume of other short video apps in India such as Roposo, Chingari, Trell, Mitron, TikTik, and Moj rose rapidly. Even pure high-copycat apps such as TokTik, TikTik, Tik India, TkaTak, and TakaTak also achieved impressive download volume.

What's more, Sumit Ghosh, co-founder of Chingari, said frankly that he planned to copy TikTok's strategy. He believes that copying a platform is not always wrong. Even Prayank Swaroop, an Indian investor at the US venture capital fund Accel, publicly stated on Twitter that "if you are developing a product that can replace these (banned) apps, please email me."

Now many short video application platforms have received financing. On the second day of the ban, Indian short video platform Mitron received seed funding. And thanks to the continued growth of users in the months after the ban, TikTok's old rival ShareChat announced that it had received $40 million in investment, which was in contact with ShareChai's own short video application Moj launched not long ago.

With the promulgation, implementation and upgrade of China's APP ban, these apps are trying their best to occupy the market gap left by the withdrawal of Chinese overseas apps.

The last chance for Chinese apps in India at this stage

During this period after Chinese apps withdrew from the Indian market, driven by the government and capital, the original Chinese app market was quickly occupied...

However, according to Caixin, there are more than 500 Chinese apps in the Indian app market, and many Chinese companies are holding their ground. Some companies may even use "jackets" to try to break through the blockade. Although India has banned Chinese apps, the Google Play Store will not conduct similar screening, and developers only need to use personal accounts to upload apps.

This method of operation seems to have left a glimmer of hope for many banned apps, but the "disguised packages" cannot appear in the app market using the original brand. Not only do they need to change the account, icon and name, but even the main company must be changed.

It should be noted that although the "vest package" can solve the urgent needs of some companies, the original technology and account system can be used to break through the Indian blockade. However, such operations may bring risks of breaking the law. Yang Xuhong, deputy general manager of the Mumbai branch of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, analyzed to Caixin that it is not feasible to re-enter the Indian market by re-vesting the removed apps, because the court has notified these companies that if they continue to operate, they will be suspected of criminal violations. If they are found out after changing their vests, they will face criminal liability.

The road to investment is not easy

Interestingly, the current first-tier Chinese app alternatives all have Chinese capital, such as Shunwei Capital and Xiaomi, which both invested in ShareChat in the past, and received investment from Tencent last year. ByteDance invested $25 million in Indian news and e-book app DailyHunt as early as 2016.

In November 2019, Dailyhunt again received funding from ByteDance through the secondary market. In April this year, ByteDance once again invested in Dailyhunt. Shortly after the ban came, on July 4, Dailyhunt announced the launch of Josh to join the competition in the short video field.

It can be seen that India wants to integrate Chinese capital and does not want Chinese investors to "go it alone" in India, but to adopt a deep tie-up with India through cooperation. In other words, India wants China to invest in its own companies, rather than directly moving Chinese companies to India.

However, it is becoming increasingly difficult to include investment. On April 17, the Indian government updated its FDI (foreign direct investment) policy, requiring that capital from neighboring countries must obtain prior approval from the Indian government when investing in India. This means that any capital increase or investment in companies in India will be subject to review by the Indian government.

Like a "disguised package", Chinese capital has also found ways to package itself to enter India, such as going to India via Singapore, or looking for companies owned by local people in India. Chinese investment companies obtain the profits of local companies through contractual control.

Where is the way out?

Faced with India's siege and blockade, what is the way out for Chinese apps if they want to make money in the Indian market?

In fact, there are many companies in India that are unable to build technical breakthroughs. In the APP industry chain, there are suppliers who sell codes in bulk and outsourcing development companies that can provide customized services. These suppliers can come from any country. A Chinese developer said that developing an application that can have video and text chats like WeChat and send updates to Moments would cost 50,000 yuan in development fees, and 5% of the turnover revenue would be shared.

The code templates sold in bulk are even cheaper. Mitron, which claims to be the Indian alternative to TikTok, was discovered by Indian media that its source code was a packaged version purchased from Pakistani software developer Qboxus. The prototype was a copycat app called TicTic developed by the same company. Shivank, the company's co-founder, admitted this in an interview. At first, the company had only two people. In order to launch the app as soon as possible, they directly purchased the code template, and the code cost only $34.

However, we could have made a lot of money overseas through our self-developed APP, but we had no choice but to let a piece of the pie go to us…

Summarize

Nowadays, India is stepping up its pace to ban Chinese apps. Although there are only a few "top" apps left in India, small and medium-sized enterprises can take the opportunity to test the waters in India. During this period, we must continue to improve our technology and actively develop overseas markets. Continuous technological progress can ensure the competitiveness of our products, and opening up more overseas markets can better deal with situations like India banning Chinese apps.

In addition, other domestic companies that have not been banned should pay close attention to the latest developments. At the same time, all kinds of application manufacturers that are going to the Indian market should pay enough attention to data compliance and government relations.