Name: Xiayi Sun Type: Company Report Company Name: Tiktok

1. Name: sunxiayi

2. • Popularity of smartphones
• Video based UGC is emerging
• People need more ways of entertaining
PROBLEM
It seems that it’s THE time for a short-video app to take flight.

3. • Launched in 09/2016 by ByteDance
• Create short videos in 15 seconds
• Share across platforms
PRODUCT

4. Financials
• In 2012, Bytedance was first invested by Susquehanna International Group
• By mid-2014, Sequoia leaded a funding round of $100 million
• From 2017, aquired overseas products including Flipagram, News Republic and musical.ly
• In October 2018, raised $3 billion in the Private Equity Round leading by Softbank.
• Valued more than $75 billion, surpasses Uber to be the most valuable start-up in the world.

9. Secret Sauce
• Rich Investment in the Initial Stage
• Backed by ByteDance
• Ads/Sponsor in popular TV shows and apps
• $400,000~$500,000 per day for marketing
• Several million dollars for marketing and
operation costs 2017

10. Secret Sauce
• Technology
• Founder: EECS degree; had startup experience;
Expert in information retrieval and distribution
• Unique feeds distribution algorithm makes it easier for user
generated content to stand out
founder: Yiming Zhang

11. Secret Sauce
• Technology
• Computer vision technology supported by
ByteDance’s AI lab
shape in a dancing feature

12. Secret Sauce to Success
• Technology
• Filters incorporating computer vision technologies(e.g. hair dye)

13. Competitions
Product Tiktok/Douyin IGTV Lasso Kuaishou
Filters Yes Yes
Focus on youth Yes Yes
KOL Yes Yes
Focus on tier 1 cities Yes
Socializing Yes Yes Yes
Short video < 5 mins Yes Yes Yes

14. My Prediction
• Success!
• More marketing/operations budgets and investments
• Backed by ByteDance’s AI Lab
• More KOL join
• However, it must innovate to retain users, also reinforce its
private settings and rules to avoid lawsuits in face of stronger
regulations

15. References
http://report.iresearch.cn/wx/report.aspx?id=3118
https://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/Deloitte/in/Documents/technology-media-telecommunications
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TikTok
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-09-28/35-year-old-unknown-creates-the-world-s-most-val
https://www.zhihu.com/question/68754774
https://expandedramblings.com/index.php/musically-statistics/
https://36kr.com/p/5095703.html
https://thedailyreview.in/anatomy-of-tik-tok-the-viral-video-app-from-bytedance/
https://www.pingwest.com/a/150064
https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/bytedance#section-overview
https://36kr.com/p/5144367.html
https://baijiahao.baidu.com/s?id=1588653472144357072