Former TikTok CEO Kevin Mayer on new U.S. joint venture: I think it's a good deal - part 1/2
December 19, 2025 • 6m 30s
Arjun Kharpal (Tech Correspondent)
00:00.070
tick
tock
CEO
telling
employees
that
its
parent
company
bite
dance
has
reached
an
agreement
to
create
a
new
US
joint
venture
that
will
hold
the
US
version
of
the
app
and
that
will
be
majority
owned
by
US
investors
Arjun Kharpal (Tech Correspondent)
00:13.030
kevin
meyer
meyer
is
the
founder
and
co-founder
co
CEO
of
candle
media
he's
also
the
former
CEO
of
tik
tok
and
the
former
CEO
of
bytedance
and
CNBC
's
beijing
bureau
chief
eunice
yun
is
here
as
well
she
joins
us
here
at
the
nasdaq
this
morning
as
well
so
folks
Arjun Kharpal (Tech Correspondent)
00:29.110
let's
run
through
this
first
of
all
kevin
what
do
you
think
what
does
this
do
does
it
meet
the
security
regulatory
regulations
that
congress
laid
out
Kevin Mayer (Founder & Co-CEO)
00:39.110
well
it
seems
to
me
in
looking
at
the
deal
from
what
i
can
tell
it
it
does
meet
that
byte
dance
seems
to
be
and
chinese
ownership
seems
to
be
below
the
twenty
percent
threshold
you
have
a
very
trustworthy
american
corporation
oracle
running
the
algorithm
retraining
the
algorithm
Kevin Mayer (Founder & Co-CEO)
00:54.550
managing
the
data
flow
making
sure
data
access
is
limited
to
the
US
data
access
is
limited
only
to
the
US
checks
all
the
boxes
and
i
think
in
addition
to
Kevin Mayer (Founder & Co-CEO)
01:04.030
that
you
still
have
bite
dance
helping
out
with
the
commercial
operations
in
terms
of
ad
sales
and
E
commerce
and
the
rest
that
just
seems
like
a
low
security
risk
but
a
good
way
to
to
make
sure
their
value
is
there
the
top
line
the
bottom
line
are
driven
the
right
way
i
think
Kevin Mayer (Founder & Co-CEO)
01:17.110
it's
a
good
deal
Arjun Kharpal (Tech Correspondent)
01:18.990
eunice
what
do
you
think
from
the
perspective
of
china
at
this
point
obviously
if
this
is
something
that
solves
the
security
issues
the
united
states
was
looking
for
is
it
a
situation
that
the
chinese
can
live
with
too
Eunice Yoon (Beijing Bureau Chief)
01:29.790
it
looks
like
it
i
mean
there
hasn't
been
any
official
chinese
government
response
except
for
a
very
boilerplate
statement
from
the
foreign
ministry
where
they
said
that
beijing
's
position
is
consistent
and
clear
but
the
signaling
that
we're
getting
in
the
state
media
is
that
Eunice Yoon (Beijing Bureau Chief)
01:44.870
this
has
beijing
approval
and
there's
a
lot
of
citation
of
a
pro
beijing
professor
who
is
saying
that
this
deal
is
in
line
with
chinese
law
Eunice Yoon (Beijing Bureau Chief)
01:56.070
and
they're
saying
specifically
that
this
is
not
a
sale
of
the
algorithm
that
oracle
is
only
reviewing
they
said
the
algorithm
so
there
isn't
any
way
that
they
would
be
able
to
copy
or
steal
it
and
that
bytedance
is
the
single
just
shareholder
in
the
JV
and
that
tick
tock
will
Eunice Yoon (Beijing Bureau Chief)
02:12.030
remain
they
say
a
hundred
percent
owned
by
byte
dance
kevin
Andrew Ross Sorkin (Squawk Box Co-Anchor)
02:16.350
what
do
you
make
of
that
this
whole
this
whole
thing
has
revolved
around
the
algorithm
about
who
owns
the
algorithm
who
controls
the
algorithm
how
the
algorithm
can
work
and
for
so
long
there
was
an
argument
being
made
that
if
you
didn't
control
the
algorithm
you
couldn't
Andrew Ross Sorkin (Squawk Box Co-Anchor)
02:30.390
actually
train
on
it
in
some
other
way
and
change
things
from
a
security
perspective
Kevin Mayer (Founder & Co-CEO)
02:37.580
yeah
well
it
seems
andrew
to
me
that
there
was
some
positioning
going
on
here
the
thing
that
the
thing
that
i
liked
the
least
about
this
announcement
was
that
the
there
was
no
official
chinese
government
approval
as
part
of
it
but
it
sounds
from
eunice
that
that
is
being
Kevin Mayer (Founder & Co-CEO)
02:52.100
positioned
in
in
that
market
Kevin Mayer (Founder & Co-CEO)
02:55.240
look
i've
heard
that
the
that
the
algorithm
although
still
owned
and
and
the
code
being
owned
by
china
the
it's
going
to
be
licensed
and
there'll
be
a
new
instance
of
it
the
code
will
be
transported
to
oracle
servers
in
the
the
US
and
retrained
and
though
the
code
elements
will
Kevin Mayer (Founder & Co-CEO)
03:11.190
be
the
same
the
retraining
is
what
causes
the
algorithm
to
suggest
the
the
various
videos
in
the
four
U
feed
so
i
do
Kevin Mayer (Founder & Co-CEO)
03:16.990
think
the
training
of
it
the
housing
of
it
and
the
fact
that
the
data
that
would
be
used
to
train
the
algorithm
for
us
users
is
only
going
to
be
captured
in
the
US
and
stored
in
the
US
and
viewable
only
in
the
US
i
think
it
meets
most
of
the
requirements
and
i
do
believe
you
Kevin Mayer (Founder & Co-CEO)
03:32.150
know
there's
some
face
saving
that
has
to
happen
the
chinese
government
has
to
has
to
spend
at
a
slightly
different
way
the
US
government
slightly
different
way
but
in
total
seems
like
it
meets
the
requirements
Andrew Ross Sorkin (Squawk Box Co-Anchor)
03:41.830
how
do
you
see
the
success
of
tiktok
going
forward
i
mean
one
of
the
questions
that
at
some
point
was
whether
you'd
have
to
reload
for
example
the
app
onto
itself
you
know
entirely
whether
that
would
actually
create
you
know
churn
at
that
point
you
know
in
terms
of
bringing
Andrew Ross Sorkin (Squawk Box Co-Anchor)
03:58.670
advertising
into
into
the
platform
in
ways
that
doesn't
exist
today
or
or
or
ways
to
actually
make
more
money
because
this
is
never
been
seen
interestingly
despite
the
valuation
as
some
kind
of
you
know
shocking
business
Kevin Mayer (Founder & Co-CEO)
04:12.310
well
look
i
i
think
the
i
think
a
setup
for
success
from
the
from
a
commercial
perspective
i
think
the
ads
will
continue
there
are
ads
now
by
the
way
a
fair
number
of
ads
interstitial
videos
Andrew Ross Sorkin (Squawk Box Co-Anchor)
04:22.590
whether
that
changes
Kevin Mayer (Founder & Co-CEO)
04:24.830
yeah
i
don't
think
it
is
because
as
also
as
i
understand
it
byte
dance
will
continue
to
oversee
ad
sales
the
commercialization
of
the
app
in
terms
of
E
commerce
and
the
other
ways
that
it's
optimized
and
and
monetized
in
from
the
in
the
from
the
users
Kevin Mayer (Founder & Co-CEO)
04:40.510
i
do
think
that
the
app
download
is
probably
going
to
be
a
bit
of
a
non
issue
apps
are
updated
in
background
all
the
time
on
phones
and
mobile
devices
through
iOS
and
through
the
google
play
i
just
don't
think
that's
going
to
be
a
big
friction
moment
for
people
to
you
know
to
Kevin Mayer (Founder & Co-CEO)
04:56.790
abandon
the
app
i
think
it's
going
to
be
pretty
smooth
sailing
it's
going
to
be
interoperable
as
it
is
today
across
the
world
again
with
the
data
being
encapsulated
in
the
US
looks
like
a
seamless
approach
looks
like
it's
going
to
work
to
me
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