[Funding alert] ShareChat raises $300M from Google at $5B valuation

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 ShareChat, 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.