Millions of social media users in India are left without a platform after Koo, a homegrown microblogging site touted as an alternative to X (formerly known as Twitter), announced its shutdown. The founders cited a lack of funding and high technology costs as the reasons behind the decision.
Launched in 2020, Koo allowed messaging in over 10 Indian languages and gained significant traction in 2021 when several Indian ministers endorsed it amid a dispute between the Indian government and X.
The conflict began when Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government requested that X block a list of accounts it claimed were spreading fake news, including those of journalists, news organizations, and opposition politicians. X initially complied but later restored the accounts, citing “insufficient justification.” This led to threats of legal action against X’s employees in India by the government.
In response, a wave of supporters, cabinet ministers, and officials from Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) migrated to Koo, with many calling for a ban on X in India. By the end of 2021, Koo had reached 20 million downloads in the country.
Despite its initial success, Koo struggled to secure funding in recent years. On Wednesday, founders Aprameya Radhakrishna and Mayank Bidawatka revealed that Koo was “just months away” from surpassing X in India in 2022, but a “prolonged funder winter” forced them to scale back their ambitions.
“We explored partnerships with multiple larger internet companies, conglomerates, and media houses, but these talks didn’t yield the outcome we wanted,” they wrote on LinkedIn. “Most of them didn’t want to deal with user-generated content and the wild nature of a social media company. A couple of them changed priority almost close to signing.”
In February, Indian news websites reported that Koo was in talks to be acquired by news aggregator Dailyhunt, but the negotiations fell through. By April 2023, Koo had laid off 30% of its 260-member workforce due to severe losses and funding shortages.
The founders expressed their desire to keep the app running but acknowledged that the high cost of technology services made it unsustainable, leading them to make the difficult decision to shut down the platform.
