The new investments, part of ShareChat's third funding round
this year, was led by Alkeon and saw participation from Singapore's Temasek
Holdings and Moore Strategic Ventures, among others, the company said in a
statement.
Reuters is first to report the fund raising.
ShareChat raised $145 million in July from Temasek and others at a valuation
of around $3 billion.
Content-sharing and short-video apps have become popular in
the country since New Delhi last year banned ByteDance's TikTok and some other
Chinese apps following an India-China border clash.
ShareChat - which has 180 million active users - allows
users to post content in 15 Indian languages. After TikTok was banned, the firm
also launched a similar short-video sharing app named Moj which has 160 million
users and counts Meta Platforms Inc's Instagram Reels as its key rival.
"Both our products have been leading the market ...
This fresh funding will further strengthen our position and help us deliver
immersive social experiences," Ankush Sachdeva, ShareChat's CEO, said in a
statement.
The company will also use the funds to develop its apps'
artificial-intelligence capabilities, it said.
Social media and video-sharing apps in the country have been
sought after by investors who want to cash in on India's rapidly growing base
of internet and smartphone users. Indian consumers - both in urban and rural
areas - are increasingly consuming digital video content through apps or
streaming platforms.
ShareChat said in its statement that users of its Moj app
spent an average 34 minutes every day consuming video content. © Reuters
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