Who is making ByteDance? Zhang Yiming leads 14 generals, and the 106 senior executives are exposed for the first time

Annie from Niuaofei Temple
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ByteDance is the parent company behind TikTok, Toutiao, and Xigua Video.

In the past year alone, the number of employees at the headquarters of this AI-driven company has almost doubled to 40,000. Its products have also spread overseas, and the overseas version of Douyin, "Tik Tok", has even been called a "viral" short video app by foreign media.

How did Zhang Yiming and ByteDance achieve massive growth in just a few years?

The answer is here. The technology media The Information reported on ByteDance’s organizational structure and personnel division of responsibilities, including 106 corporate executives and the business lines behind them.

△ Zhang Yiming, CEO of ByteDance

Half of the sales and content review

The real ByteDance Group has a huge business matrix.

In China, there are more than ten applications covering information, video, education, social networking and other fields:

• News: Toutiao, Toutiao Express, and Automotive News

• Video: Tik Tok, Huoshan Video, Xigua Video

• Education: Study Hard, Gogokid

• Social: Duoshan, Banciyuan

• In addition, there are the joke gathering place Pipixia, the online literature platform Fanqie Novel, the beauty camera Faceu, Qingyan Camera, and the office suite Lark.

At present, many products have entered overseas markets, including the overseas version of Tik Tok, the overseas version of Vigo, the overseas version of Buzzvideo, and the overseas version of Topbuzz... However, although ByteDance has vigorously expanded its overseas business, most of its current revenue comes from domestic sources.

Such a huge business matrix has also led to a sharp increase in the number of talents required by Douyin.

The most convincing evidence is that during the general layoff frenzy of the "Internet winter" in China last year, ByteDance's employee number almost doubled to 40,000, even surpassing Facebook's 35,600 employees.

The personnel composition of ByteDance is different from that of traditional Internet companies. According to The Information, about half of the 40,000 employees are actually engaged in advertising sales or content review, some are engaged in algorithm-related work, and about 5,000 employees are software engineers.

In this sense, this technology company, which is driven by personalized recommendation algorithms, is actually a labor-intensive enterprise.

In the short seven years since its founding in 2012, ByteDance has grown rapidly and has formed a unique talent structure.

It is these mysterious senior executives who support such a huge business system.

Zhang Yiming and his 14 generals

ByteDance’s current talent structure is roughly 1-14-106.

Zhang Yiming, the current CEO of ByteDance, directly leads 14 company executives. Among them, under the 14 top leaders, The Information also counted more than 90 second-in-command, a total of 106 people.

The 14 people directly under Zhang Yiming's jurisdiction are: Chen Lin, Zhang Nan, Xie Xin, Gu Wendong, Yang Zhenyuan, Hong Dingkun, Zhang Lidong, Tian Xiaoan, Liu Zhen, Hua Wei, Yan Shou, Li Liang, Zhang Fuping and Chen Zhifeng.

Chen Lin

Current CEO of Toutiao.

In March 2012, Chen Lin, a computer master from Peking University, joined ByteDance as an early core employee. He served as a product manager for a number of core products and grew from a product manager to the general manager of Toutiao.

Since November 2018, Chen Lin has served as CEO of Toutiao.

Chen Lin has 12 people under him, including Zi Jingxin who is responsible for product strategy, Zhang Qianchuan who is in charge of Toutiao business and small games, and Zhang Xinhao of Pipixia, all of whom report to Chen Lin.

Zhang Nan

Director of Interactive Entertainment Services

Zhang Nan’s team includes six people including Chen Lifeng, Zhu Jun, Zhi Ying, etc., who are responsible for product lines such as Douyin, Volcano, and Faceu.

Xie Xin

Currently serving as Vice President of Toutiao, in charge of corporate efficiency

Xie Xin graduated from the Computer Science Department of Peking University. He was formerly the CTO of Kuxun Travel and also worked as a PM at Microsoft. Since April 2015, Xie Xin has joined Toutiao.

Liang Rubo, Xu Zhe and Wu Weijie report directly to Xie Xin.

Gu Wendong

He is currently the vice president of Toutiao, in charge of financial-related businesses.

Currently, Gu Wendong also serves as the executive director and legal representative of Beijing Huaxia Insurance Brokerage Co., Ltd. The company is 100% owned by Fujian Bytedance Technology, and Zhang Yiming ultimately holds 98.81% of the shares of Beijing Huaxia Insurance Brokerage.

Yang Zhenyuan

Vice President of Technology at ByteDance, currently responsible for the recommendation algorithm business.

Yang Zhenyuan graduated from the Computer Science Department of Beihang University in 2005, in the same class as Zhang Yiming.

Yang Zhen worked at Baidu for nine years from 2005 to 2014, mainly responsible for search architecture. In 2014, he was poached by Zhang Yiming from the position of deputy director of Baidu's search department to ByteDance.

At present, technical personnel including Ma Weiying, director of the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, report directly to Yang Zhenyuan.

Hong Dingkun

Vice President of Technology, ByteDance

He graduated from the Computer Science Department of Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications in 2008 and worked at Baidu Tieba for five years after graduation. After that, Hong Dingkun worked briefly at Xiaomi and joined ByteDance in 2014.

Now, Hong Dingkun is in charge of search and development business, and Liao Baohua, Chen Songlin, Li Han and others report to him.

Zhang Lidong

Partner and Senior Vice President of Toutiao

Zhang Lidong was born in 1979. He joined the Economic News Department of Beijing Times in September 2002, responsible for reporting news in the fields of energy, medicine and other fields.

Since 2004, Zhang Lidong has been mainly responsible for reporting on the automotive field, and later served as vice president of the editorial committee of Beijing Times and director of the advertising center.

In 2013, at the invitation of Zhang Yiming, Zhang Lidong became his partner and senior vice president, mainly responsible for the commercialization of Toutiao.

Now, Zhu Shiyu, Liu Siqi, Pu Yanzi, Zhao Rui and others report directly to Zhang Lidong.

Tian Xiaoan

Vice President of Toutiao

Tian Xiaoan worked at CICC for 10 years, serving as managing director, co-head of TMT, and head of financial investment institutions. He also previously worked at Citibank, Hong Kong Stock Exchange and other companies.

In December 2017, Tian Xiaoan, then co-head of CICC TMT, joined Toutiao as vice president of Toutiao.

Liu Zhen

Senior Vice President of Corporate Development, Toutiao

Liu Zhen graduated from the Law School of Renmin University of China with a bachelor's degree, and then went to the Law School of the University of California, Berkeley to study law and obtained a master's degree.

She was formerly the senior vice president of Uber China and was known as the "number one lady" of Uber China. She is also the niece of Lenovo Group founder Liu Chuanzhi.

At present, Chang Yujie, Yang Xinzhou and others report directly to Liu Zhen.

Hua Wei

Currently serving as deputy general manager of Toutiao, mainly responsible for human resources and other affairs

Hua Wei was previously in charge of investment at Phoenix.com, and was previously poached by Zhang Yiming to ByteDance to be in charge of human resources.

Hua Wei's team is also responsible for the affairs related to the President's Office, and the team under him is as follows:

Strict

In charge of strategy and investment business.

Although there is not much public information about Yan Shou, judging from the team structure diagram provided by The Information, the investment team led by Yan Shou has a large number of people, and ByteDance's investment portfolio cannot be underestimated.

In addition, directly under Zhang Yiming's leadership are Li Liang, head of the Public Relations Department, and Zhang Fuping and Chen Zhifeng of the Government Relations Department.

The information revealed that the Didi Chuxing executives it interviewed said it was difficult for the industry to poach people from ByteDance because ByteDance's salary was much higher than the industry average.