The Strategist

Chinese TikTok refuses to move headquarters to London



07/20/2020 - 08:37



Chinese company ByteDance, which owns the TikTok app, is considering London as the site for the global headquarters of the social network, writes The Sunday Times, citing a source.



pixabay
pixabay
According to the newspaper, negotiations with the UK government are now suspended. According to a Reuters source, the issue is still under discussion.

According to The Sunday Times, the Chinese company is going to place about 3,000 of its employees in London. Earlier, ByteDance said that the TikTok app will become unavailable to users in Hong Kong in the coming days due to the adoption by the Chinese authorities of the national security law in this special administrative region of the PRC. 

Despite the efforts of the Chinese company to distance itself from Beijing, the US authorities have expressed concerns about the processing of data from users of TikTok. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that Washington is considering banning TikTok in the country. White House chief of staff Mark Meadows said that sanctions on Chinese-origin applications could be imposed soon.

A source of Reuters said the UK is one of several locations that ByteDance is considering as headquarters, but no decisions have been made. 

source: thetimes.co.uk