Elon Musk’s Twitter plans could take inspiration from Chinese language tremendous apps

Elon Musk’s revived $44 billion deal to purchase Twitter sparked recent debate over what the billionaire will do with the service if he ultimately owns it.

On Tuesday, Musk tweeted that purchasing Twitter is an “accelerant to creating X, the all the things app.” He didn’t present additional particulars.

Musk could also be hinting towards so-called “tremendous apps” that are well-liked in China and different components of Asia and pioneered by the likes of Chinese language expertise big Tencent.

Tremendous apps is a time period to explain an app that usually acts as a one-stop store for all of your cellular wants. For instance, you would possibly order a taxi or meals through the app and on the similar time do funds and messaging. This eliminates the necessity to have a number of apps for various capabilities.

Chinese language app WeChat, run by Tencent, is the most important tremendous app on the earth, with over a billion customers.

In WeChat, customers can message individuals, do cellular banking, pay for issues on-line or in retailer by scanning a barcode, play video games, submit movies, do on-line purchasing, hail a automobile and lots of different issues.

When Musk talks about “the all the things app,” he may very well be interested by WeChat.

The Tesla CEO has beforehand expressed admiration for WeChat calling the app “nice” throughout a city corridor with Twitter staff in June. Musk mentioned there isn’t any WeChat equal exterior of China.

“And I believe that there is a actual alternative to create that,” Musk advised staff. “You principally dwell on WeChat in China as a result of it is so helpful and so useful to your every day life. And I believe if we may obtain that, and even near that with Twitter, it might be an immense success.”

Musk mentioned that he needs no less than a billion individuals utilizing Twitter, up from 237.8 million on the finish of the second quarter.

One in every of WeChat’s greatest options is WeChat Pay. This can be a characteristic the place customers can scan a barcode in a retailer to pay through their cellular or they will ship cash to mates through the chat operate. WeChat Pay will also be used for purchases on-line.

Musk mentioned throughout the city corridor that he thinks that funds inside Twitter can be an “attention-grabbing factor to do.”

Nevertheless, tremendous apps like WeChat have not actually taken off in a giant approach in Europe, the U.S. and different western markets.

WeChat in the meantime is closely censored in China, one thing Musk is unlikely to do with Twitter, given his previous criticisms of the platform’s content material moderation technique which the billionaire feels has stifled free speech.