Koo's Chinese investor will be exiting fully, says app co-founder

The app is facing more load than ever, Aprameya tweeted requesting patience from new users and also clarified that Koo's China connection will soon be a thing of past.

As made-in-India Koo has gained considerable traction in the last few days as ministers are moving on to the desi microblogging platform, the app is on its way to get rid of its Chinese investor, Koo co-founder Aprameya Radhakrishna has tweeted as social media users raised questions over the app's Chinese connection. Chinese investor Shunwei Capital is a small stakeholder of the company at present, and its stakes are being bought by other companies, Aprameya confirmed.

What is Koo? Which ministers have already joined this made-in-India app?

"Koo is an India registered company with Indian founders. Raised earlier capital 2.5 years ago. Latest funds for Bombinate Technologies is led by a truly Indian investor 3one4 capital. Shunwei (single-digit shareholder) which had invested in our Vokal journey will be exiting fully," he tweeted.

As India and San Francisco-headquartered Twitter is engaged in a face-off over Twitter's "inaction" to take action against account "inciting genocide", Koo has got a shot in the arm as several ministers having huge Twitter following have opened accounts on Koo as well. Some government departments, including the ministry of electronics and information technology, opened their accounts on Koo. In fact, the accounts are quite active as the Meity published its initial reaction to Twitter's blog post on Koo.

In this backdrop, a Chinese investor on board can sully the image of the homegrown app. But that has been already taken care of as Koo has recently raised about ₹30 crore fund from a clutch of investors, including 3one4Capital, which is backed by former Infosys CFO Mohandas Pai.

The new app saw a huge load in the past few days in what is being called as 'Koo coup'. "We have got more love than we expected. Our systems are facing more load than ever. Thank you for placing your trust in us. Our team is working on overdrive to fix it. We request your patience and support through this time," Aprameya tweeted.

Koo was founded in March 2020 by Aprameya and Mayank Bidawatka. It was one of the winners of Aatmanirbhar App challenge 2020.