BUSINESS INSIDER – May 13 – Christian Wiklund, CEO of Skout, wants to build a global network on the scale of Facebook and Twitter. Skout is adding 40k – 50K new users on the app every day. Dating and flirting only comprises ~20%t of Skout's use cases. Most use it to just meet new friends.
Q: What are you focusing on now?
CW: To build a global network for meeting new people.
Q: Things weren't always doing this well though.
A: It's really in the past year that we've really taken off. A year ago we were signing up 100K per month. Now it's 40-50k users per day.
Q: What are you using the money you've raised for?
A: I don't want to take one market by market, I want to push everything as quick as possible. We need more engineers, iOS developers and back-end developers.
Q: A big focus now seems to be dating. Will that change?
A: Our lates survey found 80% were now using it for finding new friends, 20% for dating. It's a place people go to socialize. Will there be flirting? Yes. Will there be friendships made? Yes.
Q: What's are the goals for this year?
A: Keep pushing the product forward.
Q: Do you still expect to make money if you shift the focus away from dating?
A: Skout is free. We charge for extras such as seeing who checked you out. My bet is that it's still gonna work.
by Matt Lynley
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