Ingredients for Success:
Connect culture and product. Roland and Rexy realized early on that the key to high quality, consistent user generated content is to create a safe space on the Kumu app. They linked their culture of acceptance and positivity to build a product that does the same for its users. This ‘link’ has enabled artists to contribute to the growing base of content at Kumu.
Gain trust first, then expand. Given the success of Kumu’s livestreaming feature, the founders are bound to be inundated with new opportunities. But, they choose to deepen and expand upon the experience of what their users love – livestreaming – to gain their trust. With time, Rexy and Roland plan to use this trust to experiment with new verticals.
Community can define your moat. Although Kumu launched as a messenger app, its community was most engaged with the livestreaming feature. As a founder, you might have a vision for the future, but sometimes, you have to allow users to point you in the right direction.
Everybody is on their own journey. For some, they find their purpose early on in life. For others, it’s an arduous road that requires intent, discipline, and experimentation. Meet Rexy – a native of the Philippines, a student of international development, and (lucky for him) one who realized his purpose early. “I’ve always been passionate about unlocking the creative and economic force of the global Filipino community.”
Roland, who spent more time working in the US, always felt the urge to make an impact in the Philippines. “I wanted to bridge the gap between the innovation happening in the US and the global Filipino community.” Both Roland and Rexy were away from the Philippines at the time, but clearly, their passion and purpose was aligned. It only made sense that fate, and a bit of luck, would bring them together to develop one of the fastest growing consumer internet companies in Southeast Asia – Kumu.
Testing the Waters
The year is 2013. Rexy, in his final year at Brown, has a realization that defines his career for years to come. “On one side, I was interested in economics, international development, and social entrepreneurship. On the other, I was frequently organizing community nights with the Filipino community at Brown. It hit me during my senior year: I had to find a way to tie these two interests together.”
That prompted the launch of Rexy’s non-profit, which aims to mobilize the Filipino diaspora youth: Kaya Collaborative. The goal was simple. Through this initiative, Rexy would provide a platform for young US-based Filipino ‘fellows’ to work on short-term social ventures in the Philippines. This would allow members to form a more cohesive understanding of the country, as well as enable pathways to bridge the diaspora divide between the Philippines and the US. In order to source these fellowships, though, Rexy had to build out a network with folks that had strong ties to the Philippines. In November 2015, Rexy, going about his usual outreach, pinged Roland for a potential collaboration. Little did he know, this email would lead to even bigger things for Rexy.
Fast forward a few months and Roland ends up joining the board of Kaya. “I was enamored and impressed by Rexy. We started having really interesting conversations around activating the Filipino diaspora. At the same time, I was in a pretty cushy job as an exec in Santa Monica. I was staying by the beach and life was great. But I asked myself: Is advising Filipino entrepreneurs from afar something I’d like to do? Or do I want to go big and build something at home? I distinctly recall the advice of one of my mentors: It’s about recognizing where the waves of opportunity are, because there’s only a certain window to build a surfboard and ride the waves. Kumu, in this case, could be our surfboard.”
Rexy, in parallel and perhaps influenced by his conversations with Roland, started to feel the constraints of the non-profit model. “Kaya wasn’t as scalable as I’d liked. I started to think about if there was a way we could use technology to impact a broader set of Filipinos.” Rexy and Roland soon realized the alignment in their goals. This led to the start of Kumu.
Copy-Paste
There’s something about that first conversation, when two founders, sitting across from one another, have to ask that loaded question: so…what should we spend the next 10 years building together? Fortunately, for Roland and Rexy, they had a vision in mind. “It was simple. We wanted to productize the voice of Filipinos, globally.”
In February 2018, the first “usable” version of the app was launched. But, the Kumu of early 2018 looked nothing like the Kumu of 2020.
“Around us, we saw WeChat in China, Zalo in Vietnam, Kakao in South Korea, and they all had one thing in common: they were messenger apps. So, we thought we’d built the messenger app for Filipinos! That was our initial idea for Kumu.”
As you’d imagine, messenger apps were not the most defensible product in 2018. “I started to really value the constructive feedback we were getting. There was this guy on Facebook who commented that we were three years too late with the messenger app. He had a good point,” says Rexy, with a chuckle. But as we’ve seen with several startups, the product ideation process, in many ways, is critical to success. Kumu is, by no means, an exception to this rule.
Magic of the Kumunity
Within the messenger application, the founders launched a livestream feature, too. Initially, retention wasn’t something to scoff at – Kumu did have early ‘super users’ that were actively engaged with the product. But it wasn’t enough to achieve scale. “We started looking at cohort data and analyzing user behavior. Interestingly, it showed that there was high engagement on the livestreaming side. We decided to do user research sessions and through these, our path forward was clear – there was an overwhelming passion for us to build the app around livestreaming, and not just have it as a feature. It’s that magic to let the community define what the product is, and being humble to decide not what it is.”
With this realization, however, came a fair deal of challenges. Rexy and Roland were now building a platform business – a different beast from messaging. On top of that, there were systemic challenges with focusing on video vs. text. “We thought that the Philippines didn’t have the broadband infrastructure to support a livestreaming business. But, lucky for us, we were also starting to see broader macro support for our vision; there was major investment into 4G/LTE infrastructure and China started selling cheap and highly functional smartphones to our young, growing population.” This proved sufficient for Roland and Rexy to put their heads down and build a video-focused consumer application for Filipinos. Now the hard work was going to begin.
Chicken & Egg
The structural difficulty that exists when building a platform business is that you need to please two stakeholders, simultaneously. AirBnB wouldn’t be cool if there weren’t any home listings, would it?
For Kumu, that was the ‘chicken and egg’ dilemma. They needed creators and active viewers to scale the platform. “We had around 20-30 creators upon launch, but there wasn’t much engagement from the viewer side. We then shifted our focus to viewers by creating more interactive, game show type of content. With time, and after gaining a bit of traction, we asked ourselves: now, how could we make our creators as successful as possible?”
Interestingly, the success and growth of Kumu’s creator audience is linked to the firm’s culture itself. “We wanted to replicate Disney’s culture in our app. When you go to Disneyland, for example, doesn’t it feel like the safest, most fun place in the world? You may not know this, but Disney invests a ton in their security measures. We wanted to produce that safe space for our users in Kumu – it’s the only way to scale and encourage the creation of high-quality user generated content.”
The words safety, positivity, and acceptance were constant during my conversation with the founders. This was the crux and backbone of the culture they wanted to create at Kumu; not only since it creates a fun and healthy working environment, but because it permeates into the app itself. This link between Kumu’s culture of acceptance and the success of its user generated content is something to reflect on. It goes to show: culture is more than just a buzzword.
Tagalog, Cebuano, Ilocano
Diversity is the name of the game in the Philippines. The country’s deep rooted colonial history has resulted in a rich fusion of Spanish, Japanese, and American influences throughout. There’s no surprise then, why Roland sidestepped my question on Kumu’s expansion across Southeast Asia. “There’s no need to think about the broader region, for now. Kumu is uniquely Filipino – it’s been our mission to serve the Philippines since we launched, and that’s our plan for the future, too. Think about it: aside from the 70 million digital users in the country, we have another 11 million active users abroad. We want to go regional with Filipinos globally.” But, I insisted, and wanted to learn more about whether there was a GoJek-like-ambition to enter neighboring countries. “Honestly, we want to double-down on the Philippines, but we’re open to doing joint ventures with other companies in the region. We think we’ve developed a playbook to scale and could apply our learnings to other startups in Southeast Asia,” says Roland.
The undisputed winner of user generated content thus far is TikTok, and I wanted to hear from Roland and Rexy on their thoughts around defensibility.
“There’s no doubt that TikTok is taking the world by storm. But we think there's a place for the both of us in the Filipino tech ecosystem. The best way to highlight this is to look at China. You have Dǒuyīn (TikTok in China) in one corner, and Kuaishou in the other. You may not have heard of Kuaishou, but they are really similar to TikTok except more localized and relationship focused.”
Googling Kuaishou, I found out that they have 300 million daily active users! Clearly, they are doing just fine with Dǒuyīn operating in the same space. It seems like Kumu’s Filipino-first approach is integral to their moat.
Give and Give
Kuaishou’s focus on relationships is also how Kumu differentiates itself. In fact, it’s the innate kindness of Filipinos that forms the foundation of Kumu’s main revenue driver and catalyst for growth: virtual gifting. “Initially, when we launched ‘virtual gifts’, which are simply microtransactions, people thought it wasn’t a sustainable revenue stream. We were waiting for gifting burnout - but it never happened! Filipinos really value talent, and through Kumu, we’ve created an environment where gifting romanticizes the relationship between viewers and creators; it’s a way to create a meaningful connection. This form of interacting with creators seems to transcend the cost of gifts.”
Some of the popular ‘gifts’ people use through Kumu are hugs, wishes for a good day, and even tissues for when people get emotional. This highlights the unique platform that Kumu has created for artists to not only share their work, but feel comfortable doing so. “Filipinos tend to be shy. Through Kumu, we’re allowing creators to perform and earn from the comfort of their homes. That was really important to us from the get-go.” It’s just another example of how Kumu’s culture of positivity and acceptance has trickled into the app in the form of the safe space it provides for artists.
Staying in the Present
Kumu’s growing list of features – including live commerce, messaging, and gaming – point to one direction: they are on track to becoming the ‘super app’ of the Philippines. “We do see adjacent opportunities where we can incorporate gaming with a social layer. Education is another interesting market for us. But, whenever I think about rolling out new features for our audience, I’m always reminded of Sarah Tavel’s quote: You can’t boil an ocean by starting with an ocean. And in many ways, we agree. We like the intentional, patient approach we are taking at Kumu: growing our livestreaming platform, with an eye towards building an end-to-end product for our users in the long-run.”
Regardless of the success they’ve had, the ‘north star’ of productizing the voice of Filipinos drives Roland and Rexy, every day. “We’re really proud of what we’ve built. We started Kumu out of the same condo I’m living in today. We are the first independent Filipino application to have 1 million monthly active users and are currently the number one application on the app store,” says Roland. Being the top-grossing app in the country comes with its fair share of opportunities and in many ways, distractions. But sticking to the present and taking things by the day are all part of Rexy and Roland’s eventual plan to be the consumer app of the Philippines.
Check out www.akshaym.me for more writing.