Hike is formally winding down operations, announced its founder and CEO, Kavin Mittal, saying the US business of the app, which had shifted focus to online gaming, was no longer feasible even though it was “off to a strong start” nine months ago.
In 2012, Mittal, a Bharti Group scion, had launched Hike as an alternative to messaging apps like WhatsApp. After the messaging platform was shut down in 2021, Hike shifted its focus to investing in online gaming platforms like WinZO and building new projects like Hike Sticker Chat expression platform.
However, the Indian government’s decision to introduce an Act in the Parliament this monsoon session banning real money gaming dealt a death blow to platforms like WinZO and those investing in them, such as Hike.
The Parliament passed the Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Bill, 2025, banning all forms of online money games, while promoting e-sports and online social games to crackdown on rising instances of addiction, money laundering and financial fraud through such applications.
Also Read: Banned in India, WinZO enters US market
In a post on LinkedIn, the entrepreneur said their US business had been off to a resounding start but the India gaming ban would require a “reset that is not the best use of capital or time”.
"After regrouping with our investors and the team, I've made the difficult decision to wind down Hike completely," he wrote in the post.
"We could raise the capital, but the real question is: is it worth it? Is this a climb worth pivoting for? For the first time in 13 years, my answer is no. Not for me, not for my team, and not for our investors," he further said.
Amongst the factors that his decision weighed heavily on, Mittal said with crypto regulation still developing in countries like India, they had hoped for clarity “that never came”.
Saying they “don’t want to repeat India”, the entrepreneur added that “starting out in India locked the company into model and regulatory headwinds, turning a temporary path into a more permanent one”.
"Risk is fine; uncertainty is not," he wrote, and added that while the “Gaming Nation vision is real, we may be too early”.
For the first time, he said, he decided he wouldn’t want to put his capital and energy in such a venture since the world has changed in the last decade.
Having learnt valuable lessons in the last 13 years, Mittal said their “execution was super”, but they couldn’t “make it stick”.
“Hike Messenger reached 40 million monthly active users (MAUs)… with Rush, we built a new kind of Casual PvP gaming platform and scaled it to 10 million users and USD 500 million plus in gross revenue (CEA) in just 4 years. Our execution was super, but we could never quite make it stick," he said.
He knows now to “be careful with winner-take-all markets” and to not “build for today's constraints”.
Looking ahead, Mittal said his new chapter will look “very different” from the previous one.
"Just imagine a future where willpower is infinite, energy is abundant, and intelligence is at our fingertips. This is the future I will help build – and it's where I'll be contributing in the decades to come. The world has changed, and so have I. There are more important problems to solve and bigger opportunities to deploy brilliant talent and capital," he said.
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