ZipDial acquisition spurs move.
By Raif Karerat
WASHINGTON, DC: Social media colossus Twitter is proceeding with plans to build a new research and development facility in Bengaluru as it aims to target more users in the rapidly developing Indian market, according to British news outlet the Financial Times.
As previously reported by The American Bazaar, Twitter was rumored to be interested in Bangalore-based mobile marketing startup ZipDial, and eventually capitalized by acquiring it for about $40 million in late January.
“It does constitute a big vote of confidence from Twitter at the global level in India,” said Rishi Jaitly, Twitter’s India Market Director, to the Financial Times. “It is a big investment in India and emerging markets, and an engineering center is a big outcome [of the ZipDial deal].”
Analysts say if Twitter can successfully integrate ZipDial’s technology into its own, the social media giant may have a profit-laden avenue to reach users who don’t subscribe to data plans, opening up an entirely untapped market.
Despite cell phone usage in India exceeding that of the United States, most Indians do not have a data plan according to Valerie Wagoner, ZipDial’s founder.
“You can simply just dial a number from any phone regardless of whether or not you have a smartphone, and start following tweets from the prime minister, or the cricket national champion … so it’s really about how do you create access for 100 percent of mobile devices, whether or not you have a smartphone today … and then gradually upgrading people into the richer and richer experiences that Twitter can offer,” Wagoner told CNBC’s Worldwide Exchange.