Kavin Bharti Mittal

Kavin Bharti Mittal is an Indian internet entrepreneur. He is the founder and CEO of Hike.

Kavin Bharti Mittal
Born1987 (age 34–35)
Alma materImperial College London
OccupationFounder and CEO of Hike Messenger
Known forHike
Parent(s)
Websitewww.hike.in

Early life

Mittal is the son of entrepreneur Sunil Mittal and Nyna Mittal. He graduated in Electronics and Electrical Engineering from the University of York and completed his Master's in Electrical and Electronics Engineering and Management from the Imperial College London.[1] Kavin interned at McLaren Racing, Google and Goldman Sachs while studying at Imperial College London. At McLaren Racing, he helped the Formula One team embed a technology that would show the track flags on steering wheels.[2][1]

He had a keen interest for coding, Mittal started coding during his college times and was building apps for big platforms like Facebook and Apple Inc. When the iPhone launched in 2007 and followed with the App Store in 2008, Mittal, still in his final year at college, brought together a few friends to build his first App for the iOS platform - MoviesNow, a movie-ticketing app in collaboration with movietickets.com.[3]

Career

After moving back to India, Mittal founded Hike in 2012 as an Indian internet company that developed social communication and entertainment products.[4] From 2012 to 2018, Hike built a SuperApp centered around messaging to bring India, a mobile-first population online. At its peak in 2018, Hike reached 30M+ monthly active users and had raised over $250M in capital from investors such as Tiger, Tencent, SoftBank & Foxconn.[5][6][7]

In 2018, the market dynamics shifted removing some of the constraints they were building for as incredibly cheap data (4G) and very high-quality subsidized smartphones flooded the market. The smartphone was now the SuperApp and a SuperApp itself was no longer needed.[8][9]

In 2019, they decided to shut down the app [10][11] and pivoted the company to focus on building Rush. In August 2021, they announced an undisclosed round of funding from some product builders and investors:[12] Kavin was featured in the Forbes 30 Under 30 list for 2017.[13] Kavin was part of 35 under 35 Entrepreneur magazine 2016 list.[14]

See also

References
  1. Ghosh, Shauvik (7 March 2013). "The defining moment: Kavin Bharti Mittal". mint. Retrieved 27 April 2022.
  2. "10 next-generation business tycoons: Meet the kids of India's richest people". GQ India. 29 January 2020. Retrieved 27 April 2022.
  3. Menon, Rashmi. "Hike Messenger's Kavin Mittal says, it is hard to go back when you realise you can change the world". The Economic Times. Retrieved 27 April 2022.
  4. "Hike Instant Messenger App Crosses 20 Million Users Mark". https://www.gizbot.com/. 16 June 2014. Retrieved 27 April 2022. {{cite news}}: External link in |work= (help)
  5. Singh, S. Ronendra. "Hike raises $175 million from Tencent, Foxconn". @businessline. Retrieved 2021-11-15.
  6. "Hike Messenger raises $175 mn from investors led by Tencent". The Hindu. 2016-08-17. ISSN 0971-751X. Retrieved 2021-11-15.
  7. "India's WhatsApp rival Hike raises $175M led by Tencent at a $1.4B valuation". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2021-11-15.
  8. Thomas, Ayushi Kar | Thomas K. "Super apps won't work in India: Kavin Bharti Mittal". @businessline. Retrieved 2021-11-15.
  9. Sharma, Nishant. "Hike's Kavin Mittal On Why The Super App Model Won't Work In India". BloombergQuint. Retrieved 2021-11-15.
  10. Mittal, Kavin Bharti (2019-09-23). "Future of Social – The Rise of Social Niches". Medium. Retrieved 2021-11-15.
  11. Mittal, Kavin Bharti (2019-09-24). "2019: Multi-Apps > Super App". Medium. Retrieved 2021-11-15.
  12. "Hike secures new funds from Tinder cofounder Justin Mateen, others". The Economic Times. Retrieved 2021-11-15.
  13. Wang, Yue. "Kavin Bharti Mittal, 29 - pg.1". Forbes. Retrieved 2018-03-19.
  14. Sabharwal, Punita (2017-02-28). "Meet the Zen Billionaire of India - Kavin Bharti Mittal". Entrepreneur. Retrieved 2017-11-29.
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