WhatsApp, the Facebook-owned messaging service used by more than 1 billion people worldwide, tests a system that allows companies to talk directly to WhatsApp users for the first time, according to communications about the project seen By Reuters.
The tests, which are carried out with a handful of companies that are part of the Y Combinator startup incubator, are an important sign of how WhatsApp plans to make money from its immensely popular service.
WhatsApp has not developed a business model within three years since Facebook Inc. bought it for the modest sum of $19bn.
WhatsApp, a pun on the phrase "What's up", It has helped to upend mobile services by allowing users to text or call friends and family for free, without text message charges. In competition with similar services such as WeChat, a unit of Tencent Holdings Ltd. China.
A potential source of revenue is to charge companies that want to communicate with customers in WhatsApp. However, the company works carefully to avoid spam message problems, the documents show.
WhatsApp is also surveying users about the extent to which they talk to businesses on WhatsApp, and whether they have ever received spam, according to the documents.
WhatsApp last year announced its development plan system, known as an application programming interface, or API, citing examples such as a user talking to a bank about a fraudulent transaction or an airline on a delayed flight.
Last month, WhatsApp signed an agreement with Y Combinator, which offers training and business development advice that show the potential, to have a small number of companies participate in an early trial, according to emails and messages posted on a Y Combinator forum.
Read More: The CIA can read your WhatsApp messages and more: WikiLeaks
Admission to Y Combinator, founded in 2005, is very competitive, and previous participants include such companies like Airbnb and Dropbox.
A WhatsApp spokeswoman declined to comment on the testing of the system.
Y Combinator President Sam Altman said in an email that he did not know the WhatsApp test, but he added: "In general, we see a lot of companies that want to test their products with CY cos."
The trial is still in the early stages, said Umer Ilyas, co-founder of Cowlar Inc., one of the new companies involved. The system is highly anticipated in remote locations where WhatsApp is particularly popular, he said.
Cowlar makes collars for dairy cows, collect data on its activity and recommend changes to improve milk production.
The company, which tests the collars in the United States, wants to use WhatsApp to send automatic alerts from the collars directly to farmers if say, a cow is not behaving normally, Ilyas said.
"This represents a great opportunity, because in all major dairy markets - India, Brazil, Pakistan - many farmers have access to WhatsApp," he said in a telephone interview.
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