New Delhi: Homegrown short video platform ‘Chingari’ said Friday that it has roped in Bollywood actor Salman Khan as brand ambassador and investor. “This is a really significant partnership for Chingari, our ethos is to reach out to every state of Bharat. It’s our pleasure to have Salman Khan on-board as one of our global brand ambassadors and investors,” ‘Chingari’ co-founder and CEO Sumit Ghosh said. Ghosh expressed confidence that the association will power Chingari to scale greater heights in the near future. Details of investment made by Salman were not disclosed.
Talking about the association, Salman said Chingari has focused on adding value to its consumers and content creators. “I like how Chingari has shaped up in such a short span of time, a platform for millions from rural to urban to showcase their unique talents and be seen by another millions in no time,” Salman said.
Deepak Salvi, co-founder and COO of ‘Chingari’ said he believes the actor’s mass appeal will help the app attract more users. “Chingari has always focused on empowering the content creators. It builds on its strategy to continuously bring exciting content for all users with more relevant and robust features, for the larger Bharat,” Salvi said.
‘OnMobile Global Ltd’ said Wednesday it has led a USD 13 million (Rs 98.7 crore) funding round in ‘Chingari’. Last year, ‘Chingari’ had raised over USD 1.4 million from investors like Angel list, iSeed, Village Global, Blume Founders Fund, Jasminder Singh Gulati and others.
‘OnMobile’ has said the latest investment will allow ‘Chingari’ to accelerate its growth from 56 million users to over 100 million users. ‘Chingari’ will also use the funds to enhance its content portfolio and hire top talent.
Tech4Billion Media owns the Chingari app. It allows users to upload videos in 14 languages including English, Hindi, Bengali, Gujarati, Marathi, Kannada, Odia, Punjabi, Malayalam, Tamil, and Telugu.
Chingari app was first launched on the Google Play Store in November 2018. It was later rebranded and redesigned in June 2020. The app had witnessed a massive surge in its user base last year after the Indian government banned 59 apps with Chinese linkages, including Chingari’s rival TikTok.
Since the ban, several homegrown apps like Roposo, Chingari and Josh (Dailyhunt) have seen significant growth in downloads and user signups on their platforms.
