[Funding alert] ShareChat raises $300M from Google at $5B valuation
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Short video app Sharechat’s parent company has raised nearly $300 million in funding from Google, Times Group, and Temasek Holdings, Reuters reported on Monday, citing two sources familiar with the discussions.
The deal values the social media company at $5 billion, the report said.
This is tech giant Google’s second investment in the short video space in the country after it backed Bengaluru-based unicorn VerSe Innovation’s Josh.
The space has been getting heated in India after the government banned TikTok in 2020. Considering its popularity in India, a lot of homegrown clones of TikTok came up after the ban to capture the market.
Mohalla Tech, the company that owns
, was founded by IIT Kanpur alumni Ankush Sachdeva, Farid Ahsan and Bhanu Singh in 2015.It was last valued at $3.7 billion after it raised $266 million in December last year. Backed by investors including Lightspeed Ventures, Tiger Global, Snap Inc, Twitter, and India Quotient, it entered the unicorn club in April 2021.