Jongla Pushes into Asia, Focuses on Content in Messaging App Battle
The world’s top messaging apps might have over half a billion users between them, but plenty of startups still see room for growth – especially in Asia. That’s the case with Finland-based Jongla (pronounced “yong-ler”), which launched in December and is now seeing strong uptake in the region, particularly in Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Australia.
世界大手のメッセージアプリを使うユーザ数を合わせると5億人を超えているかもしれない。それでも、まだ成長の余地が——特にアジア地域において——残っていると思うスタートアップは多い。フィンランドに拠点をおくJongla（発音は“ヨンラー”）もそう考えている。同サービスは12月にローンチされ、アジア地域——特に、タイ、シンガポール、マレーシア、フィリピン、オーストラリア——で大きな成長を見せている。
Available for iPhone, Android, and as a HTML5 web app, Jongla CEO Riku Salminen tells us that the team is encouraged by the “involved, hardcore” users they’re seeing in Asia and plan to open an office in Asia in the second half of this year. The messaging app is aimed at users globally, but Riku reckons that the specially commissioned artwork in its animated emoticon packs is proving particularly popular in this region. The next version of the iPhone app will add language support for Vietnamese, Indonesian, Japanese, and Korean, and all that is in the newest Android iteration already.
Facing competition from the likes of WeChat, Line, KakaoTalk, Whatsapp, and newcomers like US-made MessageMe, Riku believes that they’re strong rivals but they’re mainly “good for getting users at home”. Instead, Jongla wants to be truly international and inclusive. The Finnish startup sees many ways that can happen: with quality content, a growing in-app store, and being ready to roll with HTML5 once Firefox OS hits the market.
I get the impression that the Jongla store is going to be used for a lot more than just sticker packs – such as its latest range featuring the Scandinavian classic cartoon Moomins – and that content publishing might be on the horizon as well. Though unable to reveal specific plans, Riku concedes the store will be used for “any content, including localized” stuff, and he says they’ll “sell any other content that’s relevant to users”. We’ve seen KakaoTalk do this recently with a new publishing platform that, for now, is limited to Korean content.
As chat apps evolve, it’s possible that they’ll come to be defined by their ancillary services – Line for games and as a broader social network, KakaoTalk for social gaming, Cubie for doodling and drawing, WeChat for (maybe) a mobile wallet and much more in future, and Whatsapp for… er… ummm… something.
Indeed, such accompanying feature-sets will likely be crucial to survival. So we look forward to seeing where Jongla takes its content, and how its user-base in Asia and around the world reacts to that.
Grab Jongla for iPhone or Android, and there’s a Windows Phone version coming soon.
確かに、これらの付随サービスは生き残るためには重要な要素となるだろう。だから、Jonglaのコンテンツサービスが同アプリの将来をどう左右するのか、そして同アプリのアジアと世界のユーザーがそれに対してどのように反応するのかが楽しみだ。
Jonglaアプリのダウンロードはこちら（iPhone版／Android版）。Windows Phone向けのアプリはまもなくローンチ予定。
確かに、それらの付随的機能セットは生き残るには重要な要素かも知れない。そこで当社はJonglaがどの分野で自らのコンテンツを生み出すのか、そしてアジアや世界のユーザたちがそのコンテンツにどう反応するかを楽しみに見ていきたい。
iPhone用またはAndroid用のJonglaを手に入れると、Windows Phoneバージョンが間もなく登場する。
