NEW DELHI|BENGALURU: Homegrown entrepreneurs and venture capitalists have given a thumbs-up to the government's decision to ban 59 Chinese apps, saying it presents a significant opportunity for local companies, particularly those operating in the e-commerce, social media and gaming sectors.
"The belief that the global apps would be used by Indian users has, in the past, dried up resources for building these products locally... This ban gives a unique opportunity to Indian technology entrepreneurs to build and own some of the most highly used internet products," said Aprameya Radhakrishna, CEO of
Vokal, a peer-to-peer knowledge-sharing platform.
Vokal recently launched Koo, a microblogging platform in Indian languages that allows users to express themselves on the internet.
Over the last two years, Chinese companies such as social media app
TikTok, short video platform Likee, and fashion and apparel-focused e-commerce companies, like Club Factory and
SheIn, had made deep inroads into India's fast-growing digital content-guzzling populace, often outpacing local counterparts in the process.
"India has never been in a better place to be recognised as one of the most attractive markets to invest in, given its size, growth in digitisation and democratic structures...The biggest evidence of this are the investments in Jio Platforms over the last few weeks," said
Anup Jain, managing partner of
Orios Venture Partners.
Gaming apps such as
Clash of Kings and Mobile Legends have also been included in the list of banned Chinese apps, potentially opening up opportunities for local players to step in and grab a larger slice of the country's still-nascent, but fast-growing mobile gaming space, which is currently estimated at 350-400 million, according to industry experts, and anticipated to cross 500 million over the next 12-18 months.
"This is the time when people have to really pull up their socks and create best-in-class products... This will help us in distribution, while discovery of products can get much better now," said Paavan Nanda, co-founder of gaming startup WinZO.
For other Indian ventures, the latest development has become the best opportunity to ramp up their user base, go deeper into tier-2 and tier-3 towns and cities, monetise their offerings and establish themselves as leaders in a market dominated by mobile users hungry for content and well-discounted products.
"This is going to change the trajectory and create a whole new revolution for home-grown apps," Pulkit Agrawal, CEO of video-blogging venture
Trell, told ET.
According to Agrawal, Trell has already started seeing the benefits of the interim order.
"Users have become more aware and informed about the Chinese apps and possible national security and privacy risks of using them; now they are migrating to the Indian counterparts wherever possible," he said.
TikTok claims an estimated 200 million users in India.