‘The Little Yellow Bird Says Its Final Goodbye’: Homegrown Start-Up Koo Shuts Down

Problems for the start-up started earlier in September 2022 when Koo first laid off nearly 40 employees. Later in Feb 2023, Bidawatka issued a warning to the employees that more layoffs were expected

In April, the company’s monthly active users (MAUs) declined to nearly 3.1 million. (Image Source: X/@mayankbidawatka)

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Social media start-up, Koo, is now closing its services after it failed to finalise acquisition talks. The platform, which offered to provide a domestic alternative to X, is now planning to shut down.

The start-up’s co-founders, Aprameya Radhakrishna and Mayank Bidawatka, shared a post on LinkedIn on Wednesday and informed, “We explored partnerships with multiple larger internet companies, conglomerates, and media houses but these talks didn't yield the outcome we wanted. Most of them didn't want to deal with user generated content and the wild nature of a social media company.”

Sharing the detailed post, Bidawatka said, “It takes a lot to euthanize something you built with so much heart. Koo will always have a very special place in my heart for trying to challenge global giants at their game. We can and we should. May be next time.”

Notably, problems for the start-up started earlier in September 2022 when Koo first laid off nearly 40 employees, reported Moneycontrol. Later in February 2023, Bidawatka issued a warning to the employees that more layoffs were expected. 

In April, the company’s monthly active users (MAUs) declined to nearly 3.1 million. Earlier in January 2023, the company’s MAUs stood around 4.1 million. 

Following this, the start-up engaged in discussions with firms like Dailyhunt and Sharechat for a likely buyout, however, the talks didn’t result in anything.

Meanwhile, the founders later expressed via social media posts that the company had to resort to salary cuts as it wasn’t able to close the merger talks.

In another post on LinkedIn, Bidawatka earlier informed, “We have done everything to extend our runway so that employees and vendors could get paid. We've also resorted to salary cuts. It’s painful to cut salaries of people who've helped build the company. We had the option of either letting a good part of the workforce go or do a haircut for everyone. We did the latter.”