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When TikTok was the title sponsor final summer time for Vidcon, an annual conference for the creators and types that make up a key a part of the short-form video app’s viewers and business, it was Chief Operating Officer Vanessa Pappas who received on stage for the trade keynote occasion.
Months later, when TikTok was grilled by Congress over privateness and safety considerations, Pappas was the TikTok government within the sizzling seat fielding questions.
But whereas Pappas has arguably been the public face of the corporate for a lot of the previous few tumultuous years, she has completed so whereas appearing as TikTok’s second-in-command. The one that has truly served because the CEO of some of the well-liked apps on the planet for almost two years is a longtime tech finance government named Shou Zi Chew, based mostly hundreds of miles away from Washington, in Singapore.
In Silicon Valley, it’s widespread for tech CEOs to be family names and the faces of the corporate’s they lead. Mark Zuckerberg is synonymous with Facebook and Jack Dorsey was the bearded face of Twitter, earlier than Elon Musk acquired it. But Chew, who took over as TikTok CEO in April 2021, had largely stayed out of the highlight at a time when the app he leads can’t appear to keep away from it.
That all modified in current weeks. Chew testified earlier than Congress on Thursday for the primary time, in a closely-watched listening to concerning the platform’s potential nationwide safety dangers and its affect on youthful customers. Ahead of his look, Chew went on a media tour, talking with a number of US newspapers and assembly behind closed doorways with members of Congress as a part of a broader messaging marketing campaign to assist save the app within the United States.
After averting a menace of a ban in 2020, TikTok has more and more discovered itself beneath scrutiny from state and federal lawmakers within the United States over considerations about its ties to China by its Chinese mum or dad firm, ByteDance, in addition to over fears that it may have a dangerous affect on youthful customers.
Some US lawmakers have as soon as once more renewed calls to ban the app outright. The Biden administration is threatening to ban the app if TikTok if its Chinese house owners don’t dump their stake within the platform. And officers within the European Union have additionally begun toughening their rhetoric towards TikTok.
The heightened scrutiny on TikTok could now prolong to Chew. Even earlier than his Washington debut, the CEO had to reply to pointed letters from US senators, and simply final week he made the rounds in Brussels to fulfill with EU officers. At the identical time, Chew, who beforehand was CFO of ByteDance, is reportedly constrained in how a lot management he has over TikTok and the way a lot energy rests with its mum or dad firm.
In a uncommon interview on the New York Times DealBook summit in late November, Chew was requested whether or not he labored “at the behest of the folks at ByteDance and therefore at the behest of the Chinese government.” In response, he mentioned, “I am responsible for all the strategic decisions at TikTok.”
But he added that ByteDance is “organized the way you would expect an internet company to be organized,” that includes world buyers and a board of shareholder and worker representatives. “I am responsible for the decisions at TikTok,” Chew re-emphasized, “but, ultimately, I have to be responsible to the shareholders and to the board as well.”
TikTok didn’t make Chew accessible for this story or reply to requests for remark.
In interviews, Chew has described himself as a a 40-year-old father of two who likes to golf and skim books on theoretical physics. But it’s his nationwide origin that TikTok appears to love to spotlight most.
In a letter to US lawmakers in June, TikTok appeared to try to distance itself from ByteDance’ attain and mentioned it was led by “its own global CEO, Shou Zi Chew, a Singaporean based in Singapore.”
It’s not the primary time TikTok has performed up the nationality of its CEO. In 2020, because it confronted rising stress from the Trump administration, TikTok repeatedly defended itself in opposition to critics by touting its “American CEO,” Kevin Mayer, a former government at some of the iconic US corporations, Disney.
Mayer held the chief government place at TikTok for simply three months earlier than stepping down. Pappas, an Australian based mostly in Los Angeles with expertise at different huge US tech platforms like Google’s YouTube, then served as interim world head of TikTok for lower than a yr.
Then Chew took over as CEO.
“I think they brought him in specifically because, frankly, he’s not a Chinese national, and Singapore traditionally straddles the fence of these worlds,” mentioned Ivan Kanapathy, a former director for China, Taiwan and Mongolia on the White House’s National Security Council workers and present senior affiliate on the Center for Strategic and International Studies assume tank. “And they’re quite good at it, geopolitically.”
“Ultimately, I don’t think it’s going to be enough for Washington,” Kanapathy added of Chew’s Singaporean origin providing consolation to lawmakers involved about China’s attain over TikTok. “For now, I don’t think it makes much of a difference because at the end of the day, he still answers to ByteDance, and so there’s only so much he can do.”
After finishing his necessary navy service in Singapore, Chew attended college in London earlier than graduating with an MBA from Harvard Business School in 2010. He was uncovered to Silicon Valley whereas at Harvard, after he interned one summer time at a “startup” that “was called Facebook,” as he put it in an alumni highlight.
He finally went on to develop into the CFO of Chinese tech big Xiaomi, which he helped take public in 2018.
In 2013, he led a bunch that turned considered one of ByteDance’s earliest buyers. In an interview with business magnate David Rubenstein, Chew mentioned he stayed involved with the ByteDance crew all through his profession and so they finally reached out to supply him the CFO place. He took over as CEO of TikTok in April 2021, with Pappas named COO.
As CEO of TikTok, “I’m most focused on trust building,” Chew advised Rubenstein. “We are a young company and I think trust is something that we have to earn, through actions.”
Chew doesn’t tweet and has a personal, however verified, Instagram account with zero posts. He has shared a handful of movies on TikTok, principally brief clips of his travels and visits to varied TikTok workplaces. But regardless of working some of the well-liked apps on the planet, Chew largely retains his personal life non-public.
In some methods, it may be a refreshing break from sure US tech executives who can’t appear to assist tweeting their each thought. But it may additionally stem from cultural variations that come from main an enormous tech firm with a Chinese mum or dad firm, in accordance with Matthew Quint, the director of the middle on world model management at Columbia Business School. While Chew is just not a Chinese nationwide, Quint famous Chinese tech corporations and leaders which have drawn an excessive amount of consideration to themselves have confronted robust authorities crackdowns.
Even if Chew does develop into extra of a public determine, it could not matter a lot for TikTok’s future within the United States. Ultimately, Quint mentioned, “I don’t think the CEO of TikTok has much relevance at all” for US lawmakers scrutinizing its ties to China.
“We’ve seen a rotating group, many of whom are not born-Chinese nationals, and that has not swayed the pressure around TikTok from a regulatory, national security perspective over the course of the last 18 months or so,” Quint mentioned.
This story has been up to date with further developments.
Source: www.cnn.com