Bigo competitor BeLive kicks off in Singapore after $1.5m seed round

Co-founders Lim Kim Hui (L) and Kenneth Tan. Photo credit: BeLive.

When Bigo launched in March last year, the app quickly rose to dominate video live streaming in Southeast Asia. Similar to Periscope, it lets you broadcast instantly from your mobile phone.

Bigo scores especially high in app store rankings that compare how much money people spend in apps. It’s the 5th top-grossing app in Indonesia right now, according to AppAnnie data. There’s obvious viewer appetite for its mix of mundane, funny, and occasionally racy content, and willingness to spend cash in the form of virtual gifts. The company is now reportedly worth US$400 million.

We are aware of the often sexually explicit nature of live streaming. That’s something we want to avoid.

Despite Bigo’s towering presence, a new startup in Singapore thinks video live streaming can be improved.

Having just closed a US$1.5 million seed round from investors like Singapore’s media giant Mediacorp, the team led by CEO Kenneth Tan launched BeLive today. It’s an app that’s similar to Bigo at first glance, but differs in details.

Talent first

For all its popularity, Bigo is sometimes portrayed as encouraging sexually explicit behavior. It’s supposedly a way for streamers to entice viewers to spend money on virtual gifts – which means higher monetary rewards for them. In Indonesia, the app almost got itself banned because some streamers were showing too much skin.

“We are aware of the often sexually explicit nature of live streaming. That’s something we absolutely want to avoid,” Kenneth says.

BeLive formed at Singapore’s Mediapreneur incubator, a program run by Mediacorp, with the mission to be a “clean, nurturing, and safe environment” for talented creators to grow their influence.

One one featured BeLive channel, a couple is live cooking for the audience. In another, purple-haired singer Veekher is joined by a guitarist.

There are some obvious ways to prevent streamers from crossing the decency line. BeLive sets strict rules and deploys a 24/7 support team to sanction and ban users who break them. A team of curators gives extra exposure within the app only to creators who play by the rules.

But BeLive has two specific ways in which its model sets itself apart from Bigo.

BeLive doesn’t bank too much on virtual gifts to monetize.

Real money