Momo, China’s 3rd-biggest social app, launches new social network in the US

Momo, the Chinese location-based social network for meeting strangers with similar interests, has backed a new venture in the US – Blupe. This English-language app serves a similar function of finding nearby people with the same hobbies and interests.

Blupe is a separate company from Momo, but is led by Momo’s US team and CEO, reports TechNode. With “origins and support” from its Chinese parent company, Blupe is now available on the US Apple App Store, and an Android version is on the way.

Right now, the app seems to still be in the minimum viable product stage. Users are required to sign up using their Facebook accounts, and the only functions are joining, creating, and chatting in groups. Users can only join groups located within 60 miles of their GPS location.

Momo closed down the English version of its flagship app back in July of this year. The company earlier this month listed on the NASDAQ, raising US$216 million in the process.

We haven’t seen any similar location-based apps for finding nearby strangers with similar interests, hobbies, and activities in the US that really took off. Meetup is probably the closest, but is far more formal than Blupe. So maybe there’s a gap in the market, or maybe this sort of app just isn’t suitable for Americans. Time will tell.

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(Source: TechNode)