SeaPRwire

Singaporean Shou Zi Chew named new CEO of popular Chinese video app TikTok

elean
4 minutes

NEW YORK (BLOOMBERG) - TikTok, the popular short-video app, named ByteDance chief financial officer Shou Zi Chew as chief executive officer, filling the top leadership position after the departure of Mr Kevin Mayer last year. Ms Vanessa Pappas, who has served as interim head, was named chief operating officer. Mr Chew, who joined TikTok parent ByteDance last month, will remain in his post at the Chinese company, according to a statement on Friday (April 30). Previously, Mr Chew spent several years as CFO and international business president of Xiaomi Corp, where he took the gadget maker public in one of the largest-ever Chinese tech listings on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. Mr Chew, who is from Singapore, is fluent in English and Chinese. He is experienced in navigating the halls of Chinese tech companies and the boardrooms of banks like Goldman Sachs Group, where he spent time in its investment banking unit. He also previously worked for Yuri Milner's DST Global, which took a chance on ByteDance founder and CEO Zhang Yiming as an early investor in the company. The move to hire Mr Chew is a sign ByteDance is moving towards an initial public offering of some of its businesses. TikTo...

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New global R&D head for TikTok to be based in Singapore: Sources

elean
2 minutes

BEIJING (REUTERS) - ByteDance plans to move the chief of its Chinese news aggregator Jinri Toutiao, Zhu Wenjia, to Singapore to head global research and development for its hit short video app TikTok, two people familiar with the matter said. The role is newly created and would be the first senior R&D position for TikTok. Mr Zhu will be in charge of the app's product and technologies including its recommendation algorithms, the people said. His position will be parallel to TikTok's interim head, Vanessa Pappas, and will report directly to ByteDance founder and chief executive Zhang Yiming, they said. ByteDance declined to comment. The sources declined to be named as the information is not public. TikTok had come under pressure from the Trump administration in the United States to divest the app's US operations over concerns that user data could be passed on to China, which TikTok has repeatedly denied. Reuters reported last year that TikTok moved its key research capabilities outside China and had approached employees from tech giants. It also reported that ByteDance plans to invest billions of dollars and recruit hundreds of employees in Singapore, which it has selected as its Sou...

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TikTok sues US rival Triller in patent dispute

elean
2 minutes

NEW YORK (BLOOMBERG) - TikTok and its parent ByteDance sued rival Triller Inc, asking a US judge to clear up a "cloud" over the China-based popular video-streaming app after Triller accused it of using its technology without permission. ByteDance is in talks to sell parts of its TikTok unit in a deal that could be worth tens of billions of dollars after US President Donald Trump moved to ban its US operations over national security concerns. The case filed on Wednesday (Oct 28) in San Francisco federal court is a response to a patent-infringement suit Triller filed against ByteDance in late July in Waco, Texas, a hub for complaints by patent owners looking for a friendly judge and quick litigation. Representatives of Triller and ByteDance didn't immediately respond to requests for comment. Triller's allegations against TikTok and its users "cast a cloud" over ByteDance's business, according to the complaint. ByteDance is seeking a court order that it, its products and its users don't infringe the patent and that none of them are liable for damages or injunctive relief. The patent, issued in June 2017 and assigned to Brooklyn-based Mibblio Inc, covers systems and methods for creatin...

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TikTok to hire 3,000 engineers, including in Singapore, for global expansion

aseanpr
2 minutes

NEW YORK (REUTERS) - TikTok has plans to hire about 3,000 engineers over the next three years, mostly in Europe, Canada and Singapore, the company told Reuters on Tuesday (Oct 27). The move shows that the popular short-video app has not given up on its expansion plans despite lingering uncertainty over its ownership. US President Donald Trump has ordered China's ByteDance to divest TikTok amid concerns over the safety of the personal data it handles. "To support our rapid global growth, we plan to continue expanding TikTok's global engineering team, including adding approximately 3,000 engineers in Canada, Europe, Singapore, as well as the US, over the next three years," a TikTok spokesperson said. The US will remain one of the engineering hubs for the company and hire more staff, the spokesperson added. There are about 1,000 engineers working for TikTok outside of China, nearly half of them based in Mountain View, California. Reuters previously reported that ByteDance plans to invest billions of dollars and recruit hundreds of employees in Singapore, which it has selected as its South-east Asia headquarters. Mr Trump said last month that a preliminary deal for Oracle and Walmart t...