ShareChat shuts down Jeet11, fires 5% workforce

Google and Temasek-backed Mohalla Tech Pvt. Ltd, which runs social media platform ShareChat and short video platform Moj, on Friday announced the closure of its fantasy gaming platform Jeet11, thus, laying off about 5% of its workforce. 

ShareChat currently employs about 2,200 people across various roles. 

“As a standard business practice, we periodically evaluate our strategies. We can confirm that we are ceasing operations of Jeet11 and have reorganized some of our functions, which meant movement of this talent within teams and a few employee exits. This process has impacted less than 5% of our employees,” the social media firm said in a statement. 

Going forward, Mohalla Tech plans to continue hiring across role and functions to support its growth, the company said.  

This development comes after the company, in June, secured $78 million (about Rs 633 crore) as part of its Series H funding round at a valuation of about $4.9 billion from Google’s parent Alphabet and Temasek Holdings. 

ShareChat was founded in 2015 by Farid Ahsan, Ankush Sachdeva and Bhanu Pratap Singh. The firm launched Jeet11 in February 2020 to take on the popular fantasy gaming platform Dream11, allowing users to bet on cricket and football matches. 

With Jeet11’s shutdown, ShareChat’s parent joins the many tech startups which have announced employee layoffs in recent weeks owing to rising pressure to optimize costs amid a funding winter and challenging macroeconomic conditions. 

Earlier this week, news aggregation unicorn Dailyhunt and short video platform Josh’s parent firm VerSe Innovation Pvt. Ltd laid off 5% of its 3,000-strong workforce after its bi-annual performance management cycle in a bid to streamline its costs and teams.   

Last month, SoftBank-backed edtech unicorn Unacademy fired 10% of its workforce or about 350 employees in a third round of layoffs within a year, signaling the unending challenges that have mounted ahead of the edtech sector. 

Underscoring the turmoil in the sector, Prosus-backed edtech firm Brainly, an online community learning platform, is said to have laid off a portion of its employees globally including around 30 people in India in November, VCCircle had reported.