Kavin is a prominent voice in the world of Indian social tech, and has consistently shared deep, meaningful insights on behavioural patterns of online consumers.
He has written on myriad subjects, including the meteoric rise of instant messengers in India, the millennial obsession with emojis (which prompted Hike to launch HikeMoji in November), the rising need for language integration, the emergence of newer revenue models, and the advancements in artificial intelligence, machine learning, and more.
Kavin believes that changing social behaviour will dictate business models for consumer tech startups in the future. He’s particularly pleased with Hike’s “wise decision” of pulling the plug on payments this year. It had rolled out peer-to-peer payments on the Hike app in mid-2017.
Even though payments scaled fast in terms of users, growth had to be driven with incentives like cashbacks. “And this was going to be a big capital sink,” Kavin says.
Hike could, in fact, set a precedent for several homegrown startups chasing ‘superapp’ dreams without figuring out a business model to support such ambitions.
