{"id":336934,"date":"2017-03-28T16:19:56","date_gmt":"2017-03-28T08:19:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/techcrunch.com\/?p=1469567"},"modified":"2017-03-28T16:19:56","modified_gmt":"2017-03-28T08:19:56","slug":"truecaller-adds-payments-and-google-duo-video-calls-in-move-to-rival-whatsapp-in-india","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/truecaller-adds-payments-and-google-duo-video-calls-in-move-to-rival-whatsapp-in-india\/","title":{"rendered":"Truecaller adds payments and Google Duo video calls in move to rival WhatsApp in India"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sweden-based startup Truecaller made its name as a nifty mobile app that helps people fielder out\u00a0unwanted phone calls and messaging, but now it is making a move to become a platform.<\/p>\n

At a press event in India, Truecaller\u2019s largest market based on its 150 million users, the company announced a series of partnerships, including a tie-in with Google which will see the U.S. firm\u2019s\u00a0Duo newly launched video calling feature\u00a0integrated into the Truecaller app.<\/p>\n

The Truecaller app, which is dedicated to battling annoying calls, is about to become much more than that. In addition to the Duo tie-in,\u00a0Truecaller is boosting the\u00a0app by integrating Truemessenger<\/a>, its two-year-old service for making messaging smarter and managing\u00a0spam.<\/p>\n

Now, in India, Truecaller for Android will go from being a dialing app alternative to a service that can handle calls and also manage SMS and make video calls.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

But that\u2019s not quite all, Truecaller is also introducing payments, too.<\/p>\n

The company has partnered with\u00a0ICICI Bank to enable peer-to-peer payments between Truecaller users.\u00a0ICICI Bank is providing the technology behind the service, Truecaller confirmed. Beyond holding the requisite licenses for the service, the bank is using India\u2019s UPI payment system to enable it. Truecaller Pay will open\u00a0to users of\u00a0any bank in India,\u00a0both parties said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIndia has played an important role for the innovation we bring to our users.\u00a0As our product has matured, so has India as a market which made it more organic than ever to build more meaningful services on top of Truecaller,\u201d\u00a0Alan Mamedi, Truecaller CEO and co-founder said in a statement in TechCrunch<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

So, video calls, text messages and payments \u2014 that sounds like the basis of a mobile platform in line with services like WeChat in China, Line in Japan and Kakao in Korea.<\/p>\n

A Truecaller representative explained to TechCrunch that the company isn\u2019t making its service open to third parties at this point, but it is open to integrating other services where it sees a match. Likewise, the company is initially introducing these features in India but it isn\u2019t discounting the potential to introduce similar offerings in other parts of the world.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we are able to find success with\u00a0these kinda of services [in India], then we could replicate a similar model in other markets,\u201d\u00a0Kim Fai Kok,\u00a0director of communications at Truecaller, told TechCrunch. \u201cThere are\u00a0big opportunities in markets like Kenya and Nigeria, [but] we need to focus and make sure we get the first rollout\u00a0right.\u201d<\/p>\n

Truecaller is far from the only company attacking the opportunity around mobile platforms in India, which is a key growth market for tech.\u00a0The country\u2019s\u00a0online population is tipped to reach 450 million-465 million people by June 2017,\u00a0according to a recent\u00a0report co-authored by\u00a0the\u00a0Internet and Mobile Association of India, widening the audience of potential e-commerce customers. China and the U.S. currently dominate in terms of e-commerce spending, but the value of online sales in India is predicted\u00a0to reach $48 billion by 2020, analyst firm Forrester claimed<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The country\u2019s is WhatsApp\u2019s largest single market worldwide with 200 million active users<\/a>. That popularity has made it central to\u00a0the service\u2019s much-anticipated monetization plans, which may be tested\u00a0in India first. On a recent visit in India, WhatsApp co-founder Brian Acton said<\/a>\u00a0the Facebook-owned company would look at opportunities around \u201ccommercial messaging\u201d and digitals payments when the time comes.<\/p>\n

WhatsApp aside, there is also Hike, the home-grown company recently valued at $1 billion after it raised a $175 million funding round<\/a> led by WeChat maker Tencent.\u00a0Hike is following WhatsApp with a focus on messaging. While it has been more aggressive expanding into connected services like games, news and stickers, Hike hasn\u2019t revealed its active user base in India. That\u2019s fueled speculation that the numbers aren\u2019t particularly impressive.<\/p>\n

That raises an interesting point about Truecaller\u2019s move to become a platform. The company isn\u2019t competing head-on with WhatsApp. That\u2019s an unenviable task in India. Instead, it is offering a different first proposition \u2014 filtering pesky spam calls and messages \u2014 which could give it a leg up\u00a0as it aims to find engagement with these new features. Nonetheless, with an abundance of payment options already in the market, it\u2019ll be interesting to see how the new Truecaller service fares against the incumbents.<\/p>\n

More wider, an alliance with Truecaller is a tacit admission from Google that it is\u00a0struggling to find an audience for its latest messaging apps,\u00a0Duo and Allo.<\/a>\u00a0Despite product quality, Google is years late to the messaging and calling app space, which WhatsApp dominates in India and many other emerging markets. Piggybacking with Truecaller is a logical move for both, but again it remains to be seen if the combination can break the network effect that has made WhatsApp, which added voice calls in 2015<\/a> and video calls last year<\/a>, the world\u2019s most successful messaging service with more than one billion active users.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sweden-based startup Truecaller made its name as a nifty mobile app that helps people fielder out\u00a0unwanted phone calls and messaging, but now it is making a move to become a platform. At a press event in India, Truecaller’s largest market based on its 150 million users, the company announced a series of partnerships, including a tie-in with Google which will see the U.S.… Read More<\/a><\/p>\n

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