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Where is currently the hightest growth potential in mobile messaging apps?
In all messaging app segments is still high growth evident. Beside the Top10 players, special interest messaging solutions which focus on end-to-end messaging encryption and privacy features are currently strongly gaining new users. Solutions like threema.com (secure) or franklychat.com (privacy) are examples for this newest market development.

My research into the top20 mobile messaging apps plus the newcomers has brought me to the following differentiation of 6 segments:

The 6 segments model for mobile messaging apps
1) general segment (then focusing on a certain part of the messaging value chain like WhatsApp with messaging delivery);
2) ethnical segment (e.g. WeChat or local hero MMA);
3) youth/creativity segment (e.g. Snapchat, Kik, Line);
4) feature phone segment (e.g. Saya.im, mxit.com);
5) special interest segment
(e.g. focus on end-to-end messaging encryption like threema.com or on privacy features like franklychat.com)
6) customer/mCommerce segment
(e.g. Laiwang Messenger for Alibaba; Yixin for China Telecom; soon: Viber for Rakuten).

Research has shown that strongest differentiation can be reached in youth segment and general segment (with focusing on one or two parts from the messaging value chain). More analysis on how to distiguish the 6 segments to follow here soon.

The most relevant decisions in mobile messaging app development
Every creator of a mobile messaging app has to think about where to position the products in the competitive landscape. Based on my research in messaging apps, I see these two positioning matrix axes as the most relevant and impactful decisions/questions to be answered to position a messaging app: