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Musical.ly was started by entrepreneurs in Shanghai. Although it may have had US and Japanese investors, I don't think it was an American company. https://en.wi

Musical.ly was started by entrepreneurs in Shanghai. Although it may have had US and Japanese investors, I don't think it was an American company. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical.ly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical.ly >"It’s the first company to be headquartered in China, designed in China, but popular in the US," said Greylock investor Josh Elman. "Finally we’re seeing talented people who live in that ecosystem in that world and actually transcend it and build products in the US." https://www.businessinsider.com/what-is-musically-2016-5 https://www.businessinsider.com/what-is-musically-2016-5

sgustard 7y ago
Well the Reuters article says it's a US company, as does https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/musical-ly https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/musical-ly.
- unlinked_dll 7y ago
  It might have US based personnel/assets that are incorporated in the US but wholly owned by a foreign company
- huac 7y ago
  the US government says it's a US company, so...
mgraczyk 7y ago
I've heard this myth that musical.ly was founded in China before, but it's hard to believe if you look at some basic facts. One cofounder worked full time at SAP in SF bay area for several years before and after musical.ly was founded. The other says on his LinkedIn that he was working in Santa Monica for several years on either side of the founding. They lived, worked, and founded the company in CA.
- Merrill 7y ago
  According to Pitchbook https://pitchbook.com/profiles/company/149415-13 https://pitchbook.com/profiles/company/149415-13 >Primary Office 16/F, No. 127 Guodao Road, Yangpu District, Shanghai China musical.ly appears to have always had its head office in Shanghai until the acquisition. The fact that it also had significant operations in California doesn't make it a US company. Only those operations are subject to US law and would have to be divested due to disapproval by CFIUS.
  - mgraczyk 7y ago
    > musical.ly appears to have always had its head office in Shanghai until the acquisition. That's not true. I have not found a specific date, but the Shanghai office did not exist at the time musical.ly was founded. I have not found any references to the Shanghai office from before late 2015.
    - oefrha 7y ago
      I searched for the Chinese name of the company (found on Wikipedia-zh) and immediately found all the information about how the company was founded and funded.[1] It was founded in Shanghai on 2013-08-01. Not being able to find any reference on the English-speaking part of the web doesn’t mean it couldn’t have existed. [1] https://www.jfz.com/pe/d-C6e3ie12gj.html https://www.jfz.com/pe/d-C6e3ie12gj.html
      - deleted 7y ago
        [deleted]
- ahbyb 7y ago
  Alex Zhu and Luyu Yang don't sound very Californian to me.
  - 0xffff2 7y ago
    Really? As both a SoCal and Bay Area resident name alone would tell me absolutely nothing about whether someone was a native to either area.
    - DiogenesKynikos 7y ago
      Their public LinkedIn profiles say that they went to university in China. They're Chinese.
      - icebraining 7y ago
        Probably true. Of course, them being Chinese has nothing to do with where the startup was founded.
        DiogenesKynikos 7y ago
        That's true, of course. However, every source I can find says that the company was founded in Shanghai, but ended up being more successful in the American than the Chinese market, and opened up offices in California. Most of the engineers are supposedly in Shanghai, though. One more detail is that the founders appear to have worked in Silicon Valley before founding the company. Whether any of this makes any difference, as far as US law goes, I don't know. 1. https://www.businessinsider.de/what-is-musically-2016-5 https://www.businessinsider.de/what-is-musically-2016-5 2. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-bytedance-musically/chinas-bytedance-scrubs-musical-ly-brand-in-favor-of-tiktok-idUSKBN1KN0BW https://www.reuters.com/article/us-bytedance-musically/china... 3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTyg2E44pBA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTyg2E44pBA
  - Angeo34 7y ago
    Neither do German (What you Americans call Jewish) or Russian/Ukrainian names sound English yet they are by far the biggest majority of your country way ahead of the Anglos. More likely than not a European American has its roots somewhere in Central or Eastern Europe.
- xster 7y ago
  Though I think the onus is on you to demonstrate that it's a myth when you're directly contradicting the first line of the first main paragraph of their wikipage (which is referenced) "Musical.ly Inc. was founded by longtime friends Alex Zhu and Luyu Yang in Shanghai, China."
adventured 7y ago
"TikTok also says China does not have jurisdiction over content of the app, which does not operate in China and is not influenced by any foreign government." If it's a Chinese company, why is TikTok saying that China has zero jurisdiction over the app? Besides that, the US can require that Bytedance peel off TikTok / Musical.ly. If Bytedance wants access to the US market with that app, it will have to play by US rules. That works similar to how China blocked the Qualcomm - NXP acquisition. Neither Qualcomm nor NXP are Chinese companies. If the combined entity wanted access to China they had to obey China's position on that acquisition. And given China's extreme behavior on restricting US Internet companies from their market, this is more than fair game.
- yorwba 7y ago
  > If it's a Chinese company, why is TikTok saying that China has zero jurisdiction over the app? ByteDance is trying very hard to run TikTok and Douyin (抖音, the Chinese version) as separate companies that happen to share the same code but not data. For one, this is because they're well aware that Western governments are suspicious of foreign companies having access to their citizens' data. Secondly, having Chinese and international users on a shared platform also makes it more difficult to maintain the narrative mandated by the Chinese government, as each cross-border interaction is a potential hole in the Great Firewall. After the lack of data separation effectively killed Grindr, they can only hope that they've done enough and won't suffer the same fate.
  - kmonsen 7y ago
    Not sure how they can do that in a reasonable way since it is not open source? And just because the data is not in China does not mean the Chinese government does not get access, it is more like the other way round. If the data is in China you can be sure they have full access.
    - im3w1l 7y ago
      > Not sure how they can do that in a reasonable way since it is not open source? They could do the shared source thing, where select people are allowed to see the source after signing NDA's and stuff.
DeonPenny 7y ago
It doesn't matter, just like china reviews acquisitions of American companies by American companies because they do business in china the US does the same.

sgustard 7y ago

Well the Reuters article says it's a US company, as does https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/musical-ly https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/musical-ly.

unlinked_dll 7y ago
It might have US based personnel/assets that are incorporated in the US but wholly owned by a foreign company
huac 7y ago
the US government says it's a US company, so...

mgraczyk 7y ago

I've heard this myth that musical.ly was founded in China before, but it's hard to believe if you look at some basic facts. One cofounder worked full time at SAP in SF bay area for several years before and after musical.ly was founded. The other says on his LinkedIn that he was working in Santa Monica for several years on either side of the founding. They lived, worked, and founded the company in CA.

Merrill 7y ago
According to Pitchbook https://pitchbook.com/profiles/company/149415-13 https://pitchbook.com/profiles/company/149415-13 >Primary Office 16/F, No. 127 Guodao Road, Yangpu District, Shanghai China musical.ly appears to have always had its head office in Shanghai until the acquisition. The fact that it also had significant operations in California doesn't make it a US company. Only those operations are subject to US law and would have to be divested due to disapproval by CFIUS.
- mgraczyk 7y ago
  > musical.ly appears to have always had its head office in Shanghai until the acquisition. That's not true. I have not found a specific date, but the Shanghai office did not exist at the time musical.ly was founded. I have not found any references to the Shanghai office from before late 2015.
  - oefrha 7y ago
    I searched for the Chinese name of the company (found on Wikipedia-zh) and immediately found all the information about how the company was founded and funded.[1] It was founded in Shanghai on 2013-08-01. Not being able to find any reference on the English-speaking part of the web doesn’t mean it couldn’t have existed. [1] https://www.jfz.com/pe/d-C6e3ie12gj.html https://www.jfz.com/pe/d-C6e3ie12gj.html
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
ahbyb 7y ago
Alex Zhu and Luyu Yang don't sound very Californian to me.
- 0xffff2 7y ago
  Really? As both a SoCal and Bay Area resident name alone would tell me absolutely nothing about whether someone was a native to either area.
  - DiogenesKynikos 7y ago
    Their public LinkedIn profiles say that they went to university in China. They're Chinese.
    - icebraining 7y ago
      Probably true. Of course, them being Chinese has nothing to do with where the startup was founded.
      - DiogenesKynikos 7y ago
        That's true, of course. However, every source I can find says that the company was founded in Shanghai, but ended up being more successful in the American than the Chinese market, and opened up offices in California. Most of the engineers are supposedly in Shanghai, though. One more detail is that the founders appear to have worked in Silicon Valley before founding the company. Whether any of this makes any difference, as far as US law goes, I don't know. 1. https://www.businessinsider.de/what-is-musically-2016-5 https://www.businessinsider.de/what-is-musically-2016-5 2. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-bytedance-musically/chinas-bytedance-scrubs-musical-ly-brand-in-favor-of-tiktok-idUSKBN1KN0BW https://www.reuters.com/article/us-bytedance-musically/china... 3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTyg2E44pBA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTyg2E44pBA
- Angeo34 7y ago
  Neither do German (What you Americans call Jewish) or Russian/Ukrainian names sound English yet they are by far the biggest majority of your country way ahead of the Anglos. More likely than not a European American has its roots somewhere in Central or Eastern Europe.
xster 7y ago
Though I think the onus is on you to demonstrate that it's a myth when you're directly contradicting the first line of the first main paragraph of their wikipage (which is referenced) "Musical.ly Inc. was founded by longtime friends Alex Zhu and Luyu Yang in Shanghai, China."

adventured 7y ago

"TikTok also says China does not have jurisdiction over content of the app, which does not operate in China and is not influenced by any foreign government." If it's a Chinese company, why is TikTok saying that China has zero jurisdiction over the app? Besides that, the US can require that Bytedance peel off TikTok / Musical.ly. If Bytedance wants access to the US market with that app, it will have to play by US rules. That works similar to how China blocked the Qualcomm - NXP acquisition. Neither Qualcomm nor NXP are Chinese companies. If the combined entity wanted access to China they had to obey China's position on that acquisition. And given China's extreme behavior on restricting US Internet companies from their market, this is more than fair game.

yorwba 7y ago
> If it's a Chinese company, why is TikTok saying that China has zero jurisdiction over the app? ByteDance is trying very hard to run TikTok and Douyin (抖音, the Chinese version) as separate companies that happen to share the same code but not data. For one, this is because they're well aware that Western governments are suspicious of foreign companies having access to their citizens' data. Secondly, having Chinese and international users on a shared platform also makes it more difficult to maintain the narrative mandated by the Chinese government, as each cross-border interaction is a potential hole in the Great Firewall. After the lack of data separation effectively killed Grindr, they can only hope that they've done enough and won't suffer the same fate.
- kmonsen 7y ago
  Not sure how they can do that in a reasonable way since it is not open source? And just because the data is not in China does not mean the Chinese government does not get access, it is more like the other way round. If the data is in China you can be sure they have full access.
  - im3w1l 7y ago
    > Not sure how they can do that in a reasonable way since it is not open source? They could do the shared source thing, where select people are allowed to see the source after signing NDA's and stuff.

DeonPenny 7y ago

It doesn't matter, just like china reviews acquisitions of American companies by American companies because they do business in china the US does the same.