WeChat is also super popular in SEA. So we have Line from Japan, WeChat from China, KakaoTalk from Korea as the leading contenders in Asia. You see TV commercials of the apps endorsed by celebrities. They are evolving from simple chat app to a full social platform with own apps and games. You can say they compete with Facebook. I overheard a teen asking his friend why he is still using Facebook. Social apps to the teens might not be utility, more like clubs. And they want to be associated with cool clubs of the day.
You can add Whatsapp to that list, in Hong Kong at least. It's the dominant messaging app here and the company claims 50% penetration, although it's not clear by what measure.
WeChat and Line are definitely growing though. Not sure about elsewhere, but they've both been marketing pretty aggressively of late with TV and print commercials, billboards, store promotions etc.
