Instagram founder Kevin Systrom accuses Mark Zuckerberg of slowing down Instagram growth to protect Facebook
Instagram co-founder Kevin Systrom accused Mark Zuckerberg of deliberately limiting Instagram growth to protect Facebook, as revealed in the Meta Monopoly trial.
Kevin Systrom claims to be in Zuckerberg
Instagram co-founder Kevin Systrom made serious demands against Fellow CEO Mark Zuckerberg in an ongoing metamonopoly trial. Systrom said Zuckerberg deliberately restricted Instagram growth because he wanted to protect Facebook.
Systrom testified that in 2017, Instagram was deprived of additional resources that were crucial to building video tools. He shared that despite requiring another 300 employees to do video development, they received no awards. “We got zeros of 300 incremental video leaders, which was an unacceptable offensive result,” Systrom said. He added that while the company did make tough decisions, the situation would be different, suggesting a preference for Facebook.
Zuckerberg bought Instagram for $1 billion in 2012 when the app quickly became more popular. However, Systrom believes that Zuckerberg is emotional on Facebook and does not want Instagram to surpass it. Systrom mentioned that Zuckerberg may personally influence the decision to take resources away from Instagram.
A confidential email from Zuckerberg in 2018 indicated that he talked about slowing Instagram growth to avoid what he called Facebook’s “network crash.” The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) highlighted the email during the trial, and Systrom supported the claim in his testimony.
Systrom also said Facebook’s daily active users in the United States are declining, and many inside the company believe Instagram’s rapid success is the reason. “We pose a threat to their growth. If Instagram is not growing that fast, Facebook won’t shorten or plateau.”
In 2018, Systrom and his co-founder Mike Krieger decided to leave Instagram after Zuckerberg began his efforts to merge with Facebook and WhatsApp, aiming to create an “app family.”
Meanwhile, Mark Zuckerberg has been testifying for more than seven hours in the trial. When questioning the purchase of Instagram kills competition, Zuckerberg said it was “a reasonable thing” rather than building a competitive product.
The lawsuit was filed in 2020, accusing Monkey of creating an illegal monopoly in the social media community by gaining competitors such as Instagram and WhatsApp.
