Lowe Lintas Bangalore has won the business for India’s popular cross-platform Instant Messaging brand ‘Hike’. As part of the creative mandate, the agency will work towards scaling and positioning Hike as a brand endorsed and favoured by the youth. Additionally, Lowe Lintas Bangalore will also work towards enhancing Hike’s growth story in the Indian mobile app market.
With this win, Hike joins the growing list of new age Indian enterprises that have chosen the creative and strategic expertise of Lowe Lintas + Partners in helping them achieve scale and visibility. Some recent examples include Flipkart, Practo, Paperboat, Urban Ladder, Zopper, FabFurnish, TaxiForSure, Global Consumer Products Pvt. Ltd (GCPPL), CarDekho and many more.
Commenting on the association, Kavin Bharti Mittal, Founder & CEO, Hike said, “We’re excited to appoint Lowe Lintas Bangalore in our journey to build the brand Hike. The team’s out-of-the-box creative approach and brand clarity makes us excited to have them on board. We are excited and can’t wait to see the great stuff that comes out of this partnership.”
Launched in December 2012, Hike has already acquired over 35 Million users as of August 2014, in around 20 months since launch. The popular app boasts of a fairly young user base with over 90 per cent of its users being under the age of 25 and residing in India.
Commenting on the scope of offering, GV Krishnan, President, Lowe Lintas (South) said: “To be awarded the Hike mandate is inspiring and exciting. Right from the time we met, we knew we were dealing with a team that thinks and acts different. We are delighted to partner and committed to take the brand to the next level. This significant win makes our already existing portfolio of brands in the e-commerce and digital space richer.”
Already a rage with the youth of today, the Hike chat application has localized features, which are developed keeping in mind the infrastructural and cultural requirements such as Hike Offline – that lets one message their friends even when they’re offline; Hidden Mode – that allows users to hide their private chats with a password; Stickers and Emoticons – that helps users express more in their own language, amongst many other features.
Till date, the brand has raised $86 Million funding from Tiger Global and BSB. More recently, Hike was awarded as one of the most exciting brands, 2015 by Brand Equity.