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We update you on the most essential news from Asia in tech, media, and business—the things you need to know that you probably haven’t heard in Western media.
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TikTok’s Losses from the India Ban ⛈
The biggest story of this week has been the Indian ban of 59 Chinese Mobile Apps. But how much does that actually cause in losses for the newly banned companies? For TikTok specifically, we might have an idea. Sources close to Bytedance (TikTok’s parent company) have described that the Indian government’s decision to ban TikTok could lead to a revenue loss of $6 Billion for the company.
TikTok currently employs 2,000 staff in India, has 200 Million Indian users, and was temporarily banned in India back in April 2019. At the time, TikTok was accused of exposing children to pornography, cyberbullying, and predators. A report by Sensor Tower around that time estimated the ban made TikTok lose 15 million users and court documents revealed Bytedance lost up to $500,000 a day during the week-long 2019 ban. Given the importance of India and the controversy around their presence, last year TikTok announced a $1 Billion investment plan for India and plans to create a local Indian data center.
There’s another potential, more positive scenario for Bytedance. Just like the 2019 ban, there’s a chance this latest ban could be temporary. Kevin Mayer, the newly hired CEO of TikTok/COO of Bytedance and former Disney executive, posted this public letter of support to TikTok’s employees in India. He surely has one of the most rewarding, high-profile, and incredible challenging roles of any tech executive in the world. What a wild first month in the job.
Pinduoduo’s Founder/CEO Steps Down 🌄
Pinduoduo is one of the great Chinese e-commerce success stories over the last five years. The company provides a social commerce model for online shopping - allowing users to unlock great discounts by making group purchases, incorporating lots of gamification, and focusing on lower-tier cities as their target audience. Colin Huang, the 40-year-old billionaire founder/CEO of Pinduoduo announced this week that he is stepping down from his current role.
I think Pinduoduo is one of the most interesting companies in China tech. In their IPO documents, Pinduoduo literally described their aspirations to be a combination of Costco and Disneyland. The company has 480 Million users and despite being only five years old, it’s the third biggest e-commerce company in China after Alibaba and JD .
Whenever a major tech CEO changes, there’s usually a story behind it. And after Pinduoduo’s success at last month’s 618 festival, Colin Huang actually became the second richest man in China, overtaking Jack Ma from Alibaba. While Colin will still be involved in the company, he has stepped away from day-to-day operations and named his CTO Chen Lei to be the new CEO of Pinduoduo.
Gojek Unifies Brand Across South East Asia 🛵
Indonesia’s most valuable startup, Gojek, has just changed the name of their Thai and Vietnamese local brands to unify under a single international Gojek brand. Previously, Gojek’s Thai and Vietnamese brands were called GoViet and Get. Many people attribute this change as a way for Gojek to better compete with their biggest rival, Grab. Grab currently has the same brand name across all eight of the South East Asian countries where they operate.
What GoJek faces is a classic challenge of localisation vs. standardisation for international business. Major CPG brands like Procter & Gamble, Unilever, and Nestle have the exact same products operate under different names in different countries to better appeal to the local market. This applies across many other industries but Gojek has now decided to follow the standardisation of Grab and Uber. Gojek’s leadership has described the new unified brand as a way to scale the company across new markets and products. And with the investment Gojek received last month from Facebook and Paypal, the company now has even more firepower to take on their international rivals at Grab.
Update #19 - TikTok's Losses, Pinduoduo, and Gojek