The US government has launched a national security probe into Chinese tech unicorn Bytedance’s 2-year-old acquisition of a popular American lip-sync video app, reported Caixin.
Bytedance, which CB Insights values at $75 billion, paid almost RMB 1 billion for Shanghai and California-based Musical.ly and merged it into its own social short video app TikTok.
The acquisition was seen as a way for the Chinese company to gain a foothold in overseas markets and capitalize on an increasing appetite for short video.
Now the powerful Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) has launched a national security review of the acquisition amid increasing concern about TikTok’s growing global influence.