On a recent trip to Beijing, I was travelling in the subway during peak hours. I looked to my left - almost everyone I saw was on their phones. Looked to my right - same thing. Like a typical waiguoren (“foreigner”) I was fascinated.
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F82a2e9e5-c4b9-4192-8cef-fbcf9754beb9_771x461.png)
China has grown exponentially in mobile growth, creating new industries like livestreaming along the way.
In this episode of the Use Case podcast (you can listen to it on the audio file above or find it on Spotify/ Apple or Google podcast apps), I caught up with Andy Tian, the CEO of Uplive, a live streaming + social gaming+gifting platform on building a successful internet startup in China and expanding it globally.
Andy grew up in the US, went to MIT to study engineering and decided to startup in China. He is exceptionally well aware of the Indian market, which reflects a new breed of Chinese entrepreneurs looking to India as a digital economy.
Check out the timestamp of the conversation - you might find a few topics of your interest. The total audio is of ~40 minutes and something cool to listen to on your next commute!
Timestamp
00:00- Why be pirate? Company culture of a startup
05:30- Andy’s early career choices, going to MIT and moving between US & China; How has China’s startup world evolved since 2000?
10:00- What makes Andy bullish on India and how did early Chinese startups survive the “Internet Winter”?
15:10- Building a live steaming business - Entertainment vs Utility
20:00- Can India leapfrog China?
23:30- Globally, where is live streaming working and how to monetize? How does Andy look at Indian users and compare it with users in other countries
31:30- How do you compete with big platforms like Tiktok?
34:30- How are Chinese entrepreneurs looking at India as a market?
Talking of Chinese startups entering India, we dissected the product strategy Bytedance is building to launch its new music app in India, called Resso. Check out the story here or by copy pasting this link- https://turnaround.substack.com/p/decoding-bytedances-strategy-to-tap
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Would love to know your thoughts, let us know what you think in the comments section.
Thanks,
Ravish
Be CEO, Be Pirate - Uplive CEO, Andy Tian on live streaming, India-China competition and growth