“This combined with Moj’s AI and execution capabilities makes the combined business a truly world class short video platform. MX has always strived to build superior world class products, and Takatak is no exception,” said Karan Bedi, chief executive of MX Player in a statement. “I am excited to announce the strategic merger of India’s two most popular social media platforms. TikTok was reaching over 200 million users in India prior to its ban and identified the South Asian nation as its largest overseas market by users count.ĭailyHunt, a news aggregator, and advertising giant InMobi are two other large players that are currently operating in the Indian short-video space.

Their merger is the strongest sign of a broader consolidation that is about to hit the short video apps market in India.Īfter New Delhi banned TikTok in mid-2020, scores of local startups launched their own offerings to cash in on the vacuum the Chinese app left in the world’s second largest internet market. They did not disclose the terms of the deal. “This strategic partnership will enable both MX Media and ShareChat to further benefit from the synergies between long-form and short form, at a significantly larger scale, in an accelerated manner,” the two firms said in a joint statement. The size of the deal is about $900 million and it includes both cash and equity, a source familiar with the matter told TechCrunch. The deal is structured this way: MX Media, the parent firm of MX Player and MX TakaTak, and its shareholders are becoming strategic holders in ShareChat’s parent firm Mohalla Tech. Tiger Global-backed ShareChat and Times Internet-owned on-demand video streaming service MX Player have agreed to “strategically merge” their short video apps Moj and MX TakaTak, the two firms said Thursday, in a move they said would create India’s largest short-video platform.

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