California (US)- WhatsApp parent company Meta is pushing harder to attract businesses to its popular chat app to find new revenue streams beyond targeted advertisements on its other platforms, Facebook and Instagram.
On Thursday, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg unveiled WhatsApp Cloud API, a developer tool that will make it easier for businesses to message and chat with their customers.
“An important step to help more businesses connect with people and help more people message the businesses they want to support — big and small,” Zuckerberg said.
In 2014, the company, known as Facebook, purchased WhatsApp. Despite being extremely popular, particularly outside of the United States, the service has yet to generate revenue.
At the time, Zuckerberg agreed that putting ads on WhatsApp would not be the best way to monetize it. Jan Koum, WhatsApp’s CEO, left Facebook in 2018 after clashing with Facebook management over the parent company’s voracious appetite for personal information and WhatsApp’s commitment to user privacy.
Since Meta took on its new name last fall, the company has been shifting resources to help Zuckerberg realize his vision of becoming a “metaverse company.” But the metaverse is in its infancy and has an uncertain future, and the company still needs to make money in the meantime.