China’s Bytedance buys music app, plans merger

Chinese online content platform Bytedance said on Friday it would buy lip-synch platform Musical.ly in a deal seen valued at up to $1 billion.

Musical.ly, founded in China but popular around the world with teens posting videos of themselves to their favorite tunes, would merge with Bytedance in a deal worth $800 million to $1 billion, according to a person familiar with the plans.

The companies did not disclose financial details of the deal.

Bytedance, best known for its flagship news aggregator platform Toutiao, is one of China’s hottest technology start-ups and was valued at more than $20 billion in a funding round earlier this year, Reuters reported in August.

The deal could help Toutiao push into more overseas markets where Musical.ly has a bigger presence.

“[By] integrating Musical.ly’s global reach with Bytedance’s massive user base in China and key Asian markets, we are creating a significant global platform for our content creators and brands to engage with new markets,” Zhang Yiming, Bytedance chief executive, said in a statement.

Musical.ly, which will continue to operate as an independent platform, will be able to integrate Bytedance’s artificial intelligence technology.

The platform’s co-founders Louis Yang and Alex Zhu and their global team will join Bytedance and continue to run the Musical.ly platform, the company said.