One of the biggest rivals to Meta Platforms Inc.'s (NASDAQ:META) WhatsApp is Telegram Messenger. Built by Russian-born Emirati entrepreneur Pavel Durov, the service has nearly a billion users, but no human resources (HR) department and one engineer for nearly 30 million users.
What Happened: Durov told conservative media personality and former Fox News host, Tucker Carlson, that despite scaling up Telegram to nearly a billion users, with 2.5 million signing up each day, he has managed to keep his team lean.
Not just that, Durov says Telegram has not raised funds by offloading equity. It has raised over $1.5 billion via bond sales so far, and $1.7 billion via a cryptocurrency project.
However, Durov has kept equity close to his chest so far.
"Having myself as the sole owner, director, and project manager for this extensive period of time and the company's development allowed us to move faster."