INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Thousands of miles away from the U.S., where technology giants, cable networks, and studios are locked in an intense multi-billion dollar
battle to court users to their video streaming services, a startup in Bangladesh has already won the local video streaming market.And it did
all of this in six years with just $10 million
And it’s also profitable.Ahad Mohammad started Bongo in 2013
The on-demand video service began life as a channel on YouTube in 2014 before expanding as a standalone app to users a year later.Of the 96
million people in Bangladesh who are online today, 75 million of them are subscribed to either Bongo’s YouTube channel or to its app,
Ahad said.Bongo’s domination in Bangladesh is second to none in the nation
iFlix, which raised $50 million a few months ago to expand its presence in several Asian markets, and India’s Zee5 are among the players
that Bongo competes with, though their market share remains tiny in comparison.TechCrunch caught up with Ahad to get an insight into the
early days of building Bongo and what holds next for the “Netflix of Bangladesh” as it increasingly expands to international markets.
