TikTok owner ByteDance appoints China leaders, targets 100,000 global headcount

ByteDance, owner of global hit short video app TikTok, on Thursday appointed new heads for its China business and set a goal to nearly double its global headcount to 100,000 by the end of the year.

The eight-year-old start-up, which was valued at US$78 billion in its latest financing round, currently has more than 60,000 employees across 30 countries.

The Beijing-based company said in a statement that it has named monetisation head Zhang Lidong as chairman of its China business, overseeing the non-product operations, including strategy and monetisation, in its home market.

Kelly Zhang Nan, the head of Chinese short video app Douyin, will serve as chief executive of ByteDance’s China business, responsible for product operations, including Chinese news aggregator Jinri Toutiao, Douyin and Xigua Video, the company said.

Both executives will report to ByteDance founder and global chief executive Zhang Yiming, who will shift his focus to the firm’s international expansion plans, according to the statement.

“Over the next three years, I plan to visit all regions where we have offices, and learn both about local culture and also about the company’s operations in these locations,” said Zhang in the statement.

“The rapid growth ByteDance has achieved over the past eight years is a testament to the dedication of all our employees, a global team we expect to number 100,000 by the end of the year,” he added.

TikTok was the most downloaded non-game app on Apple’s global App Store and Google Play over the past two months, according to app performance tracker Sensor Tower.

The short video app’s rise to global stardom, however, has drawn attention from regulators in different countries. ByteDance is currently embroiled in a US national security inquiry into TikTok’s handling of user data.

To appease those concerns, ByteDance has stepped up efforts in operationally separating TikTok from much of its Chinese businesses, Reuters reported last year. The company also owns joke app Pipixia, Indian-language social media app Helo and work efficiency app Lark.