WhatsApp

WhatsApp Messenger, or simply WhatsApp, is an American

freeware, cross-platform messaging and Voice over IP (VoIP)
service owned by Facebook, Inc.[45] It allows users to send text
messages and voice messages,[46] make voice and video calls, and
share images, documents, user locations, and other media.[47][48]
WhatsApp's client application runs on mobile devices but is also
accessible from desktop computers, as long as the user's mobile
device remains connected to the Internet while they use the desktop
app.[49] The service requires users to provide a standard cellular
mobile number for registering with the service.[50]
In January 2018, WhatsApp released a standalone business app
targeted at small business owners, called WhatsApp Business, to
allow companies to communicate with customers who use the
standard WhatsApp client.[51][52] The client application was created
by WhatsApp Inc. of Mountain View, California, which was acquired
by Facebook in February 2014 for approximately US$19.3 billion.
[53][54] It became the world's most popular messaging application
by 2015,[55][56] and has over 2 billion users worldwide as of
February 2020.[57] It has become the primary means of electronic
communication in multiple countries and locations, including Latin
America, the Indian subcontinent, and large parts of Europe and
Africa.[55]

History

WhatsApp was founded in 2009 by Brian Acton and Jan Koum,

former employees of Yahoo!. After leaving Yahoo! in September
2007, they took some time off in South America.[12] At one point,
they applied for jobs at Facebook but were rejected.[12] In January
2009, after purchasing an iPhone and realizing the potential of the
app industry on the App Store, Koum and Acton began visiting
Koum's friend Alex Fishman in West San Jose to discuss a new type
of messaging app that would "show statuses next to individual
names of the people".[citation needed] They realized that to take the
idea further, they would need an iPhone developer. Fishman visited
RentACoder.com, found Russian developer Igor Solomennikov, and
introduced him to Koum.

Koum named the app WhatsApp to sound like "what's up". On

February 24, 2009, he incorporated WhatsApp Inc. in California.
However, when early versions of WhatsApp kept crashing, Koum
considered giving up and looking for a new job. Acton encouraged
him to wait for a "few more months".[58]
In June 2009, Apple launched push notifications, allowing users to
be pinged when they were not using an app. Koum changed
WhatsApp so that when a user's status is changed, everyone in the
user's network would be notified.[12] WhatsApp 2.0 was released
with a messaging component and the number of active users
suddenly increased to 250,000. Although Acton was working on
another startup idea, he decided to join the company.[12] In October
2009, Acton persuaded five former friends at Yahoo! to invest
$250,000 in seed funding, and Acton became a co-founder and was
given a stake. He officially joined WhatsApp on November 1.[12]
After months at beta stage, the application launched in November
2009, exclusively on the App Store for the iPhone. Koum then hired
a friend in Los Angeles, Chris Peiffer, to develop a BlackBerry
version, which arrived two months later.[12]