Heard of the Smule symphony? - The Morning Context

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Heard of the Smule symphony?

Harveen Ahluwalia

Mumbai

25 September 2019

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No, we haven’t misspelt Smile. We mean Smule, a karaoke application which is the dark horse of the Indian digital music ecosystem. The US-based app entered India in 2016. And in just two years, Smule has become the top-grossing audio application, beating streaming apps like Times Internet-owned Gaana (No. 3), Reliance Industries’ JioSaavn (No. 4) and Bharti Airtel’s Wynk (No. 5), according to a March 2019 report by industry body Ficci and consulting firm EY.

Smule is backed by Chinese internet giant Tencent, which also owns the second highest grossing audio app, StarMaker

Smule is fascinating, mainly because its growth has been quiet.

In the shadow of massive internet companies like Times Internet, part of India’s biggest media company, the Times Group, and Reliance Jio, the telecom unit of Reliance Industries, Smule is rather discreetly building its platform, which

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