Zhang Yiming is the Co-Founder and Former CEO of ByteDance Ltd., a Chinese internet technology company which is popularly known for its apps like TikTok. ByteDance was founded in 2012 by Zhang Yiming and Liang Rubo who is the Current chairman of the Company. As of January 2023, Zhang Yiming has $ 49.5 Billion net worth, according to Forbes.
Zhang started his career by working as an engineer in a travel website Kuxun but in 2008, he left the job and started working in Microsoft. After some time, Yiming left the job and in the year 2009, he started a real estate search engine with Liang Rubo named as 99fang.com., and work hard for developing the application and on 13 March 2012 they founded Bytedance. The company launched Neihan Duanzi a joke, Memes and humorous video circulating app as its 1st application which was shut down by the Chinese Government in the Year 2018.
In August 2012, with Zhang’s Hard work and efforts Bytedance launched a news app Toutiao which started to become more popular among the people and within 2 years it attracted more than 13 million users daily. Zhang started to work more for expanding the company globally and focused on developing the workplace of ByteDance and environment for the employees due to which the company started to grow more.
In September 2015, the company launched a video-sharing app TikTok which is popularly known as Douyin in China. The app started making more profit for the company as it rapidly grew globally. After that ByteDance bought Musical.ly and combined it with TikTok.
Also read | 300 TikTok, ByteDance employees worked for Chinese state media: Report
After his long service in the company, Zhang left the position of CEO in May 2021 and in November 2021, he stepped down from the position of Chairman in the Company. In 2013, Zhang Yiming was named in Forbes’s China 30 under 30 list while in the year 2018 Fortune Magazine named him in its 40 Under 40 List. In the year 2019, Zhang Yiming also gained the position in 100 Most Influential People of Time Magazine.
Zhang Yiming was born on 1st of April, 1983, Longyang Fujian in China. After his schooling Yiming went to Nankai University in Tainjin and earn Bachelor’s degree in Engineering.
