In brief
WhatsApp chief Will Cathcart has stepped down after nearly seven years at Meta’s flagship messaging app. The company has appointed Kunal Shah, founder of fintech platform Cred, to helm WhatsApp, keeping Shah as a Cred shareholder while Meta’s investment lifts its equity stake to about 20%. Zuckerberg praised Shah’s "builder mentality" and indicated a focus on expanding monetisation in India, where WhatsApp enjoys around 853 million users but faces scrutiny over data sharing. The leadership change comes as Meta strengthens its presence in the Indian market while navigating privacy concerns.
WhatsApp’s veteran boss Will Cathcart has announced his departure after nearly seven years at the helm of Meta’s messaging giant.
Cathcart, who guided the platform to more than three billion private‑chat users, posted on his social‑media channel that he was stepping back even as the app sat in “the strongest position it has ever seen”.
Meta has named Indian fintech founder Kunal Shah – the brains behind Cred – as the new chief of WhatsApp.
Shah, who built Cred into a payments‑platform that rewards high‑income customers for on‑time credit‑card payments, will remain a shareholder in Cred even as he takes on the WhatsApp role, after Meta’s $900m investment raised its equity share in the company to roughly 20 %.
“I look forward to working with Kunal to continue to make WhatsApp the best service for billions of people and millions of businesses,” Mark Zuckerberg said in a statement.
This leadership shake‑up comes at a time Meta is pushing for deeper monetisation of WhatsApp in India, a market where the app logs about 853 million users but faces scrutiny over data‑sharing practices with its parent company.
In Mumbai‑based Cred, Shah has said that Meta’s minority stake will not give the corporation any read‑access to member data.
