Re:Jan Koum to leave after broad clashes with Facebook
by paxy on Monday April 30, 2018 @05:35PM
(#16962640)
Was the business sustainable? They tried some form of paid apps or recurring subscriptions several times, but no one I know actually paid for WhatsApp ever. I imagine they were just burning through VC funds.
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Re:Jan Koum to leave after broad clashes with Facebook
by rmason on Monday April 30, 2018 @09:03PM
(#16963879)
Actually in one of their interviews after the acquisition Koum said that they still had every single penny of their VC money, they hadn't spent it. He even showed the bank statement showing it was all there before they took a second round of financing from Sequoia. Jim Goetz said they were the only startup we'd ever dealt with that was paying income tax before taking any money.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/parmyolson/2014/02/19/exclusive...
Re:Jan Koum to leave after broad clashes with Facebook
by fasj82 on Monday April 30, 2018 @05:42PM
(#16962696)
It does not take much money to run a messenger, especially one that does not store conversations or files server-side once they are delivered.
Re:Jan Koum to leave after broad clashes with Facebook
by pdonis on Monday April 30, 2018 @09:04PM
(#16963886)
Doesn't matter if revenue is less than costs.
Re:Jan Koum to leave after broad clashes with Facebook
by tim333 on Tuesday May 01, 2018 @02:30AM
(#16964955)
I paid 79p for a lifetime subscription but yeah that probably wasn't going to cover costs. They used charges partly to limit uptake when the servers were struggling I think.