EMERGING TECH/PRODUCT/PLATFORM — Snow
An emerging app is South Korean app Snow, which has risen to popularity for its many similarities to Snapchat as well for its qualities that set it apart from Snapchat. Snow has filters very similar to Snapchat, but exponentially more, and for this reason, Snow is marketing itself as especially useful for selfies. Since its release in September, Snow has had approximately 30 million downloads in Asia (https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/06/technology/snapchat-snow-korea.html?_r=1). In the App Store, it’s listed as “SNOW — Selfie, Motion sticker, Fun camera,” which reinforces their niche branding as a selfie app. Additionally, Snow includes filters catered toward what’s popular in each country; for example, in Korea, there are Korean fried chicken filters, and in Japan, there are sushi filters (NYT). You see some of this customization on Snapchat with location filters, but it seems as if Snow has taken it a step further, providing its users with a more unique and personalized experience.
An important fact to note is that Snapchat is blocked in China, so Snow is capturing many users that Snapchat is missing. Considering China’s 700 million users comprise the world’s largest internet market, there is a huge potential for growth. This corresponds with the idea that “going global” with an app with American roots may not be as feasible as it was in prior years. Moving forward, apps based in Asia like Snow have the most potential for growth. Considering that many of the filters on Snow are very similar to the filters on Snapchat, I wonder if Snapchat would eventually look to sue Snow for intellectual property theft/piracy.
