4-month-old mobile app, Hike, gets 5 mn subscribers

In less than six months of being launched, a free mobile messaging app called Hike has crossed the marks of 5 million subscriber base. The app was launched globally in December last year. It is one of the fastest growing free mobile apps globally.
Bharti SoftBank's (BSB) app 'hike' allows users to send free SMSs, even to contacts who do not have ‘hike' on their handsets. It provides subscribers access anywhere across Airtel's global network. Users can also share location, photos and videos with others. Bharti SoftBank (BSB) is a joint venture between Bharti Enterprises and mobile communication and broadband services firm Softbank.
BSB has been listening closely to its customers and introduced features they find useful, it said in its report. BSB's update to ‘hike' called ‘hike 2.0', allows status updates with moods that allows users post updates about what they are up to or what they are thinking in real-time to their close friends only, it said in a statement. It letss users to carve out a ‘Circle of Friends' in the app to whom the update would go out, it added.