Dailyhunt ended the year 2020 with a bang. The news aggregator app, which is run and operated by Verse Innovation, put the curtain down on the coronavirus inflicted year with massive funding from Google and Microsoft. Now it has started 2021 on a similar fashion, after the startup’s parent company announced on Monday it has raised $100Mn fresh funding. The latest funding is a part of the series H round and was secured from Qatar Investment Authority and Glade Brook Capital Partners. It must be noted that Microsoft and Google’s investment in December last year had Dailyhunt’s valuation over $1Bn.
Dailyhunt is a highly popular news and entertainment app that serves more than 285 Mn customers in nearly 14 different languages. It has acquired the market leader position in highly competitive news aggregator space.
Dailyhunt’s top competitors
- Inshorts
- NewsPoints
The company is also apparently buoyed by the success of its recently launched short video app Josh. Josh, which competes with other homegrown apps like Moj and Max Taka Tak, has made impressive strides in download numbers and is today counted among the topmost downloaded short video apps. The short video space has gained lot of focus following the ban on TikTok last year and subsequent clamor by Indian apps to fill the TikTok void.
What could further help the Indian homegrown apps is the recent banning of Snack Video, which was another Chinese app that become a major impendent for the likes of Sharechat’s moj and Josh in its quest to fill the TikToK void.
Just like in the news aggregator space, Dailyhunt will be hoping to achieve the market leadership position in short video app as well. However, the competition in the space has already become intense with Moj already crossing 100 Mn download mark.