S’pore Might be TikTok’s Parent Company’s New ‘Beachhead’ After US Threatens to Ban It

You’ve probably heard all about the big hoo-ha over in the US between TikTok and the US administration.

President Trump wants to ban TikTok in the country for national defence, then turned around and say, “Look, you have a choice, just sell TikTok US to an American company.”

Then, TikTok turned around and say they want to sue the Trump Administration.

That was on 23 Aug.

If you think that these two weeks have calmed the two giants down, think again because next thing we know?

S’pore Might be TikTok’s New HQ After the US Threatens to Ban It

On 11 Sep, it was reported that ByteDance, the Chinese owner of TikTok, is planning to make Singapore its “beachhead for the rest of Asia”.

In warspeak, a “beachhead” is basically a secured position where an army can launch the rest of its expansion plan from.

According to sources, the company is going to spend “billions of dollars” and add “hundreds of jobs” to Singapore over the next three years.

In fact, it has even applied for a licence to operate a digital bank here.

In addition, it will also establish a data centre here.

It was also mentioned that a ByteDance representative has declined to comment on the issue.

TikTok’s Global Situation

In the US, President Trump has given a deadline of 15 Sep 2020. TikTok is unlikely to meet the deadline and Trump has indicated that he will not extend the deadline.

In Britain, TikTok is likely to be banned from moving local data out of the country.

In India, TikTok is one of more than a hundred Chinese-made apps to be banned by the government over privacy issues.

It’s also been said that Asia is likely the next “growth area” for TikTok.

Jobs Available

If you clicked into this article, it’s definitely not just because TikTok is your favourite app.

You might be someone looking to build up a career within the Covid-19 pandemic. So with TikTok’s parent company offering “hundreds of jobs”? That’s something up your alley.

According to ST, ByteDance already has more than 200 job openings in Singapore, most of them in areas from payments to e-commerce and data privacy.

We took a quick search with the keyword “ByteDance Singapore Jobs” and here’s what we found:

Roles mainly in software engineering, data and tech leads.

In other words, technology and data-related skills required lah, most likely.

So if you’re interested in getting a job with what seems to be the next big social media platform, it might be a good time to check out all the traineeships and skills package offered under #SGUnited.

After all, data and technology-related skills are exactly what the Singapore government is trying to build in our local workforce.

You know what, I’ll leave you with the search results here.