Facebook launches Instant Articles for Android users in India

Six months after official launch, Facebook has now rolled out Instant Articles in India. The company has partnered with publications such as India Today, The Quint, Aaj Tak, Hindustan Times and The Indian Express. In conversation with Mint, Facebook’s director, news and global media partnerships Andy Mitchell said, “We at Facebook are really excited to be rolling out Instant Articles in India on Monday. We are working with a publisher ecosystem that is varied and we are excited to see how this product will resonate with Facebook users and publishers in India.” (Also read: Twitter **launches news experiment in India** ) Until now, Instant Articles was available for iOS users in the US and Western Europe. Michael Reckhow, product manager for Instant Articles along with Andy Mitchell stated that it takes an average of eight seconds for a page to load on Facebook’s mobile app. The report added that the five represent a cross-section of publishers will allow Facebook to monitor how different types of content is being consumed in the Indian market and the company will open this platform to other publishers early next year. The company hopes that this move will make users spend more time on the website, instead of moving onto other sites during the time spent on the Internet. Publishers who use this service will be entitled to keep the revenue from all ads, sold through news websites hosted by Facebook.