Agora, the Chinese-founded company powering Clubhouse, sees stocks soar as investors try to cash in on Silicon Valley’s hottest social media platform
- Agora saw its stock jump 30 per cent on Monday amid broader awareness that the start-up Clubhouse uses the company’s real-time audio services
- Clubhouse, Silicon Valley’s hottest new social app, received even more attention on Monday when Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk joined the platform
Fervour over audio-focused social media start-up Clubhouse has sent shares of Chinese-founded company Agora soaring after news started circulating online that it was providing critical back-end communication services to the hottest new social app in Silicon Valley since Snapchat.
Investors piled into Agora on Monday, pushing the stock up to US$73.60, a 30 per cent jump over the closing price on Friday. The jump came the same day Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk joined Clubhouse and quickly hit the platform’s limit of 5,000 concurrent listeners in his room, where he hosted a conversation with Vlad Tenev, CEO of online brokerage Robinhood.
Clubhouse has been drumming up a lot of excitement in Silicon Valley. The invite-only, social audio app allows users to easily organise virtual talk shows in chat rooms.
Since launching on iPhone in April 2020, the app has built a following among venture capitalists and tech company founders. The company recently raised US$100 million in funding led by Andreessen Horowitz, putting the start-up’s valuation at US$1 billion.
The hype around Agora, which went public on the Nasdaq last June and has headquarters in both Shanghai and Silicon Valley, started when news got out that it was the platform powering Clubhouse’s audio features.