Douyin CEO Kelly Zhang steps down as head of TikTok’s Chinese version to focus on ByteDance video editor CapCut and AI

Douyin CEO Kelly Zhang steps down as head of TikTok’s Chinese version to focus on ByteDance video editor CapCut and AI

07 Feb Douyin CEO Kelly Zhang steps down as head of TikTok’s Chinese version to focus on ByteDance video editor CapCut and AI

Posted at 07:30h in Asia by

Kelly Zhang Nan, the most powerful woman in ByteDance, has stepped down as CEO of the Douyin business unit that includes the Chinese version of TikTok, as well as other signature products such as news aggregator Jinri Toutiao.

Citing “business development needs and personal preferences”, Zhang will focus on CapCut, a video-editing and graphic design app, according to an internal letter sent by ByteDance CEO Liang Rubo on Wednesday and seen by the Post.

“Artificial intelligence (AI) technology will substantially disrupt content creation and even give birth to new content creation platforms,” Liang wrote. “We hope to actively explore, fully understand and seize the opportunity.”

A ByteDance representative confirmed that Zhang had relinquished her role as chief executive of Douyin, adding that the company was grateful for her leadership.

The Douyin logo seen at a ByteDance building in Beijing. Photo: EPA-EFE

ByteDance has no immediate plans to fill the vacant role, according to a person familiar with the matter, who declined to be named because they are not authorised to speak to the media.

Her latest internal move comes amid ByteDance’s intensifying efforts to explore new opportunities in generative AI, which has drawn global attention after US start-up OpenAI launched its conversational bot ChatGPT in late 2022.

The rapid development of large language models – the technology that underpins ChatGPT and similar chatbots – has sparked a new wave of AI-powered content creation apps, such as image generator Midjourney and video generator Pika Labs.
In an all-hands meeting last week, ByteDance CEO Liang berated employees for “not being sensitive enough” to emerging technologies and “lacking a sense of crisis”. He said one of the company’s priorities in 2024 would be to stay “always day-one”, referring to the need for the unicorn to keep up with its entrepreneurial spirit.

Why the secret AI sauce behind TikTok is such a vital ingredient

However, the company did not launch its chatbots Doubao and Cici AI until the second half of 2023, after Baidu and Alibaba Group Holding, owner of the Post, rolled out rival services earlier that year.

Additional reporting by Coco Feng

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