ByteDance founder Zhang Yiming donates 500 million yuan for education amid rush by tech billionaires to show charitable side after Beijing crackdown
- Zhang’s photo op at his old middle school marked a rare public appearance for the outgoing ByteDance CEO, whose net worth is estimated at US$44.5 billion
- Pinduoduo founder Colin Huang was most generous Chinese philanthropist last year, donating US$1.85 billion to various causes
Zhang Yiming, the 38-year-old founder of TikTok owner ByteDance, is the latest Chinese tech billionaire to make a generous charitable donation, giving away 500 million yuan (US$77 million) to set up an education fund in his home city of Longyan in China’s eastern Fujian province.
A photo posted online by the education bureau showed Zhang visiting Yongding No. 1 Middle School in June, surrounded by local officials and teachers. Zhang, who attended the school as a teenager, made a smaller donation of 10 million yuan in September 2020.
It marked a rare public appearance for the outgoing ByteDance CEO, whose net worth is estimated at US$44.5 billion by the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
The latest donation will be used to “train local teachers, support vocational education, improve edtech [and] renovate infrastructure like student dorms”, the statement said.
The man who turned ByteDance and TikTok into a global sensation
Donations from Chinese tech billionaires have become more frequent this year following Beijing’s increased pressure on Big Tech to serve social development and national agendas, and not just focus on profits.
Wang Xing, the founder of Meituan, which is still under an antitrust probe, earlier this month donated a US$2.3 billion stake in his food delivery giant to his own philanthropic foundation.
Colin Huang, founder of e-commerce giant Pinduoduo, stepped down as chairman in March, a day before his Starry Night Foundation promised to donate US$100 million to his alma mater, Zhejiang University, to support fundamental research in biomedical science, agriculture and food over the next three to five years.
Pony Ma, chairman of internet giant Tencent Holdings, announced in April that his company would set aside 50 billion yuan for a “sustainable social values” initiative to help solve social problems and reduce poverty.
The list, which covers the year to April 2021, counted 39 Chinese benefactors who gave away more than 100 million yuan each over the past year, with that number being the second highest in 18 years.
Still, the money given away amounted to a mere 0.5 per cent of their combined wealth, estimated at 6.5 trillion yuan, said Hurun’s chief researcher Rupert Hoogewerf.
