Get full access to one story every week, and to summaries of all other stories. Just create a free account

Anand Prakash just got off TikTok. His messages sound jubilant.

Prakash, the academic head at live tutoring app Vedantu, just held his first live session on the video-streaming social media platform. “My gut feeling is this could work like live classes on YouTube,” reads his text. Vedantu’s math channel, which features one-minute-long videos on math tips and tricks, has garnered over 500,000 followers, as of October 2019. 

The third-most downloaded app globally in the first quarter of 2019, China-based TikTok and its 15-second videos have taken India by storm. With over 200 million users in India, it is arguably China’s most popular consumer tech export. Its parent company Bytedance—valued at $75 billion—is the world’s highest-valued tech startup.

Tiktok’s popularity has made the app a destination for brands like Club Factory, Oppo and Pepsi—all looking to advertise to the largely under-30 audience. While celebrities have also embraced the platform, TikTok has created its fair share of content creator celebrities. In fact, getting to a million views is almost too easy. TikTok’s addictive vertical video feed and unbounded access to small-town India, has unlocked accessibility at scale.

But from being a purely entertainment-oriented platform, TikTok is hard at work to reposition itself as an edtech platform. According to industry experts The Ken spoke with, its #Edutok campaign—introduced in June 2019—is a calculated move to improve the company’s image. Having faced regulatory challenges over unsavoury content and intermediary ownership issues, TikTok wants to be seen as a platform that has social value. Hence, education.

“TikTok has a target on its back. Its success has created an existential crisis for home-grown apps like Sharechat,” says a Delhi-based edtech investor, who wished to comment anonymously to avoid being caught in the crossfire between the apps. According to him, TikTok—arguably the only social media app with an engaged multi-lingual, multi-regional audience—laid siege to Sharechat’s original audience. Now, Sharechat is lobbying regulators to clamp down on their rival. Tiktok is easier to chase out with regulatory pitchforks than an Alibaba, he adds. No one’s going to miss another social networking app.

For nearly four months, TikTok has courted popular content creators and edtech companies like Vedantu to generate easily understandable content specifically for its platform. Small lessons like calculating square roots or learning conversational English. 

An image revamp for TikTok, though, is only one motive for the platform’s edtech impetus. TikTok is using Edutok as a dipstick to gauge the appetite for Bytedance’s considerable edtech arsenal, something it could import from China. In light of India’s burgeoning edtech market—estimated to be worth $1.96 billion by 2021, according to a Google-KPMG report—traditional Chinese edtech companies are already eyeing the region.

AUTHOR

Olina Banerji

Based in Delhi, Olina writes about mega-trends in urban mobility, education, skilling and the environment, with a focus on how institutions and innovations can help cities grow sustainably. She is a graduate of the London School of Economics, and has worked previously with India Today and global non-profit Ashoka.

View Full Profile

Subscribe to read this story

The Ken is the only business subscription you need. Questions?

 

Premium

  • 5 original and reported longform business stories every week
  • Access to ONLY India edition
  • Close to 250 exclusive stories every year
  • Full access to over 6 years of paywalled stories
  • Pick up to 5 premium subscriber newsletters
  • 4 original and reported longform business stories each week
  • Access to ONLY Southeast Asia edition
  • Close to 200 exclusive stories every year
  • Full access to all paywalled stories since March 2020
  • Pick up to 5 premium subscriber newsletters

Rs. 2,750 /year

$ 120 /year

India Edition
Subscribe Subscribe
Most Asked For

Borderless

  • 8 original and reported longform business stories each week
  • Access to both India and Southeast Asia editions
  • Close to 400 exclusive stories every year
  • Full access to over 6 years of paywalled stories across India and Southeast Asia
  • Unlimited access to all premium subscriber newsletters
  • Visual Stories

Rs. 4,200 /year

Subscribe
 

Echelon

  • 8 original and reported longform business stories each week
  • Access to both India and Southeast Asia editions
  • Close to 400 exclusive stories every year
  • Full access to over 6 years of paywalled stories across India and Southeast Asia
  • Unlimited access to all premium subscriber newsletters
  • Visual Stories
  • Bonus annual gift subscription
  • Priority access to all new products and features

Rs. 8,474 /year

Subscribe
Or

Questions?

What kind of subscription plans do you offer?

We have three types of subscriptions
- Premium which gives you access to either the India or the Southeast Asia edition.
- Borderless which gives you complete access to The Ken across both editions
- Echelon which gives you complete access to The Ken across both editions along with a bonus gift subscription

What do I get if I subscribe?

The Premium edition gives you access to stories in that edition along with any five subscriber-only newsletters of your choice.

The Borderless and Echelon subscription gives you complete access to The Ken across editions and unlimited access to as many newsletters as you like.

What topics do you usually write about?

We publish sharp, original and reported stories on technology, business and healthcare. Our stories are forward-looking, analytical and directional — supported by data, visualisations and infographics. We use language and narrative that is accessible to even lay readers. And we optimise for quality over quantity, every single time.

Our specialised subscriber-only newsletters are written by our expert, award-winning journalists and cover a range of topics across finance, retail, clean energy, cryptocurrency, ed-tech and many more.

How many newsletters do you have?

We are constantly adding specialised subscriber-only newsletters all the time. All of these are written by our team of award-winning journalists on a specialised topic.

You can see the list of newsletters that we publish over here.

Does a Premium subscription to your Indian edition get me access to the Southeast Asia edition? Or vice-versa?

Afraid not. Each edition is separate with its own subscription plan. The India edition publishes stories focused on India. The Southeast Asia edition is focused on Southeast Asia. We may occasionally cross-publish stories from one edition to the other.

We recommend the Borderless or the Echelon Plan which will give you access to stories across both editions.

Do you have a mobile app?

Yes! We have a top-rated mobile app on both iOS and Android which allows you to read on-the-go and has some amazing features like the ability to bookmark stories, save on your device, dark mode, and much more. It’s really the best way to read The Ken.

Is there a free trial?

You can sign up for a free account to experience The Ken and understand our products better. We’ll send you some free stories and newsletters occasionally, and you can access our archive of previously published free stories. You can stay on the free account as long as you’d like.

The vast majority of our stories, articles and newsletters can be accessed only by a paid subscription.

Do you offer any discounts?

Sorry, no. Our journalism is funded completely by our subscribers. We believe that quality journalism comes at a price, and readers trust and pay us so that we can remain independent.

Do you offer refunds?

No. We allow you to sample our journalism for free before signing up, and after you do, we stand by its quality. But we do not offer refunds.

I am facing some trouble purchasing a subscription. What can I do?

Just write to us at [email protected] with details. We’ll help you out.

I have a few more questions. How can I reach out to you?

Sure. Just email us at [email protected] or follow us on Twitter.