Just a few days after Viber worked out a deal with Pakistani carrier Mobilink, Nimbuzz is also announcing a similar partnership. The deal itself is also similar to one Nimbuzz set up with India’s Aircel.
Under the terms of the agreement, Mobilink will give its 35 million subscribers access to the platform at a minimum flat cost irrespective of the data consumed. This will make it cheaper for consumers to use the popular instant messaging service than other competing apps. This agreement could help Nimbuzz grow into a stronger competitor in the Middle Eastern markets.
Nimbuzz has just reached 150 million users and plans to roll out this model of partnering with telecoms operators. Vikas Saxena, CEO of Nimbuzz thinks operator partnerships “help them to drive data usage among subscribers but also allow us access to users which we may not have had previously.”
This is the latest in a number of operator-and-app agreements we’ve reported here on TruTower. Nimbuzz also has revenue sharing agreements with carriers in Singapore and competes with Asia’s LINE and KakaoTalk for a larger chunk of the Asian market. Needless to say, it will be interesting to see where this convergence of carrier and app developer leads as the agreements continue to unfold.