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By APD writer Alice
Chinese tech giant ByteDance, which owns video-sharing app TikTok, is planning to invest billions of US dollars in Singapore with a view to turning the Southeast Asian nation into a "headquarters" for all of its activities in Asia.
This is part of the Chinese tech firm's global expansion scheme.
The company is promoting the acquisition of more cloud computing servers in the Southeast Asian nation to serve data copying. In addition, itis moving some engineers from China to Singapore as well as recruiting hundreds of new employees here starting from the second half of this year. The whole plan is expected to be implemented in three years.
Accordingly, it has applied for a license to operate a digital bank in Singapore. As the world's most valued startup,TikTok’s parent company is working to push ahead with plans to expand its social media market share in Asia, after stumbling on hurdles in India, the UK and the US.
Analyts said Southeast Asia is rapidly developing and holding a key position for Chinese technology firms in the face of growing hostility from the US and other major developed markets. Singapore is becoming a regional base for both Western and Chinese companies as it has developed financial and legal systems as well as highly educated, tech-savvy and multilingual workforce.
ByteDance is believed to have long targeted a potential Southeast Asian market with 650 million people increasingly preferring smartphones. This is similar to what the two leading Chinese technology corporations, Alibaba and Tencent, are doing.
ByteDance's operational plans in Singapore include establishing a data center and a subsidiary specializing in software, andoperating TikTok and Lark apps. It is seeking to fill more than 200 job vacancies in Singapore, in addition to 400 employees currently working in technology, sales and marketing.
Information about Bytedance's expansion in Asia came at a time when the US deadline for the resale of TikTok social network is nearing. Before that, the White House set time for ByteDance to sell TikTok to a US company on September 15. President Donald Trump’s executive order that bans US firms to do business with TikTok will be effective on September 20. If the sale takes place, the deal must be finalized by November 12. US President Donald Trump declared that this deadlines were not extended.
The sale of TikTok is at a standstill after China introduced new export restrictions. Accordingly, TikTok must get the approval of the Beijing government if it wants to sell itself to an American company. This decision caused all previous negotiations to re-start.
ByteDance is looking to retain some of TikTok's ownership in the US, while also meeting requests from regulators in both China and the US. In particular, the most important requirement is to transfer control of TikTok data operation to an American technology company, and hold ownership of certain assets.
ByteDance currently has more than 1.5 billion monthly active users. The company of tech billionaire Zhang Yiming was said to have made a net profit of $3 billion on total revenue of more than $17 billion in 2019.
In the US, this popular video creation app is making a splash with more than 100 million active users every day.
At present, two American technology giants Microsoft and Oracle are the brightest names for position as the new boss of TikTok. However, there have not been any reports confirming a possible billion-dollar deal with TikTok.
(ASIA PACIFIC DAILY)
