The Questions Around Snap’s TikTok Clone After Top Exec Resigns

After eight years at the company, Snap’s senior vice president of content and partnerships, Ben Schwerin, is departing to join Coatue Management as a general partner, my colleague Kate reported. Schwerin helped lead Snap’s Spotlight, the app’s TikTok clone launched at the end of 2020. His replacement will face the task of maintaining Spotlight’s growth as other rivals, such as Instagram’s Reels, gain momentum, as well as plotting the next chapter of Spotlight’s ad strategy. 

Snap executives have highlighted Spotlight as one of Snapchat’s fastest-growing features. In the fourth quarter, the total time spent watching those short-form videos rose more than 100% year over year. It’s already started testing ads in some markets. But growth isn’t happening in a vacuum. Meta Platforms in October said “plays” of its Reels rival on Facebook and Instagram jumped 50% from the prior six months, to 140 billion Reels every day.