Abstract
Founded in 2015, ShareChat scaled by tapping into India’s overlooked regional-language internet users, building a vernacular-first platform designed around content consumption behaviours rather than social connections. Its rapid launch of Moj, within hours of TikTok’s ban, helped the company expand into short-form video. Challenged by deep-pocketed global players such as Meta and YouTube, ShareChat carved out a niche through localised community teams, lean AI-powered recommendations and a hybrid human–algorithm approach to content curation. Yet, monetising engagement in India’s low-ARPU (average revenue per user) environment proved difficult, as ad revenues remained constrained and infrastructure costs continued to rise. By 2025, ShareChat turned cash-flow positive after pruning unprofitable users, reducing customer acquisition costs and scaling microtransactions, among other initiatives. With profitability achieved, the company now faces a strategic choice about how to sustain growth. Should it launch new content formats, or should it focus on new avenues of monetisation?
Additional Information
| Product Type | Case |
|---|---|
| Reference No. | IS0152 |
| Title | ShareChat and Moj: Building India's Social Media Company |
| Pages | 17 |
| Published on | Dec 18, 2025 |
| Year of Event | 2025 |
| Authors | Majumdar, Adrija; Chowdhry, Aryan; Jain, Ishaan; |
| Area | Information Systems (IS) |
| Discipline | Innovation and Entrepreneurship, IT and Systems, Marketing |
| Sector | Telecom and Software |
| Learning Objective | 1 To highlight the process of achieving product–market fit through regional focus and vernacular language strategies, 2 To understand the monetisation challenges in low-ARPU markets, where ad revenue is insufficient to sustain large-scale platforms, 3 To examine how platforms can use AI as a competitive differentiator, especially in recommendation systems that drive engagement, and 4 To analyse the tension between scale, profitability and sustainability in social media. |
| Keywords | Social Media, AI, Monetizing Models, Emerging markets, Platforms, Recommendation Systems |
| Country | India |
| Organization | ShareChat |
| Courses | MBA (PGP) |
| Access | For All |
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