As per a report by The Financial Times, Bytedance, the parent
company of TikTok, is said to be working on a
smartphone. The FT report quotes a source who says that Bytedance founder Zhang
Yiming “has long dreamt of a phone with Bytedance apps pre-installed” on the
smartphones. A lot of Chinese companies have used this ‘model’ of having
smartphone pre-installs for their apps.
TikTok
isn’t the only app which Bytedance is involved with. There’s Lark, which is a
collaboration tool; Felilao, an instant messenger; and there is a music
streaming app as well.
Bytedance
back in January had acquired patents and employees from phone maker Smartisan,
which also is an indicator that the company may soon launch a smartphone.
A Bloomberg report earlier this year had revealed that Bytedance
failed to meet its revenue targets for the first time. The move to launch a
smartphone will give other Chinese brands like Xiaomi, Oppo, Vivo and others some food for thought. No official word from
the company has been heard so far on it entering the smartphone business.
TikTok, meanwhile, was reported to be the most popular app on
Apple iPhone and iPad, according to
Sensor Tower. In the quarter ending March, TikTok was downloaded 33 million
times. Though it wasn’t the most popular app on Google Play Store, it was still
downloaded 88.2 million times.
The
app has had its fair share of troubles as well. India had put a temporarily ban
on the app as it was accused of promoting pornography and other illicit
content. The ban, however, was later lifted and the app is now back on both
Apple App Store and Google Play Store.
