14/01/15 NDM Story #27

BuzzFeed launches its own 'public chat' channel in messaging app Viber 

The online news site has partnered up with 'weChat' and has opened there new public chat service on Viber. 

• Online news site BuzzFeed’s initial growth may have been fuelled by social networks Facebook and Twitter, but its next frontier is likely to be messaging apps like its latest partner, Viber.
• BuzzFeed has launched a “public chat” channel within the app, which is owned by Japanese internet giant Rakuten, and which has more than 209 million monthly active users.
• WeChat and Viber may soon be joined by another high-profile messaging app as a partner for BuzzFeed. In November, it was named as one of the media companies in talks with photo and video messaging app Snapchat about serving stories to a new section of its app called Discover.

Buzzfeed has the ability to expand as it has partnered up with Viber and has launched a new chat service which could rival whatsapp.