Live data from Hacker News

ByteDance investors value TikTok at $50B in takeover bid

reuters.com

191–200 of 204 posts

Re: ByteDance investors value TikTok at $50B in takeover bid

#191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look if you think it is justified for China to keep out foreign companies, fine. But if that is your opinion then don't come crying to the rest of the world, when they do the same exact thing to Chinese corporations that China has been doing to others, for decades. Fair is fair.

I don't have an opinion on whether or not it is justified. I just think that the statement I replied to, is a very weird one. One reason being the leap of logic. And frankly I doubt the correctness of the statement altogether. There are a ton of American companies operating in China, much more than the number of banned ones. How many US companies does China really ban? What all these comments about 'fairness' also do…

> There are a ton of American companies operating in China

There are huge restrictions by China in American corporations.

You should look this up, if you are unfamiliar.

It is well accepted that there are many more restrictions, in comparison to say if an American corporation wanted to enter the EU market or something.

This is common knowledge, and it is easy to look this stuff up.

> are allowed to take protectionist measures.

And America is allowed to retaliate against them.

China can do what they want, but if they come crying to everyone else when other countries retaliate, nobody should expect others to take such complaints seriously.

Re: ByteDance investors value TikTok at $50B in takeover bid

#192

I think this is extraordinarily cruel & I can see lots on these comments where people agree but are divided (probably the ones who disagree are from the US) As someone who grew up outside the US or a western country I don't really see anything wrong with TikTok. If they do something Facebook or Google or your runt of the litter tracking script will do it. I am also not brought up in China or a country involved in thi…

> Because it simply isn't from a western country

That's a false projection. For example, products from Korea and Japan are very popular in the US. App from those countries would have no problem. China is qualitatively different.

> must be bought out at some crappy valuation

Nobody is forcing the sale, they also have the option to stop operating -- like Google chose to do re: China when they refused PRC demands.

> WhatsApp for example should be forced to sell its Indian operations to Reliance Industries

You mean like how US companies are forced to vest technology with local partners to operate in China?

https://money.cnn.com/2018/04/05/news/economy/china-foreign-...

For example, non-Chinese companies cannot sell electric cars in China without handing over their trade secrets.

Is that fair?

Re: ByteDance investors value TikTok at $50B in takeover bid

#193
post #20

It's a bit amusing to see all the "suffer Snapchat's fate" comments here. Snapchat has recovered from the low point at the end of 2018 when FB/Insta had copied the stories feature and all seemed lost. Their traffic is up, stock is up and revenue is growing quickly again ($1.18B in 2018 -> $1.72B in 2019).

It’s still below its 2017 ipo price and its EBITDA is almost -$1B.

Snapchat IPO shares were priced at 17$. It's trading at 22.59 as I type this.

Re: ByteDance investors value TikTok at $50B in takeover bid

#194
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they didn't ban US companies in retaliation either That's probably because they've already been banning American companies for years if they posed any potential thread to Communist control.

You mean, as opposed to other countries, where entities that threaten to overthrow their governments are allowed to continue to operate?

Which US companies have been banned for threatening to overthrow the PRC?

Re: ByteDance investors value TikTok at $50B in takeover bid

#195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instagram ads are better but TikTok is way more entertaining to me. I almost always get a chuckle or even a laugh every time I use TikTok, last time I opened Instagram all I got was boring food pictures, pictures of dogs and a friend's family picture...

I agree completely – and I wonder if it's part of the problem. If an advertiser on TikTok doesn't entertain me, I'm swiping. Whereas on Instagram, I'm more willing to look at some pants or whatever for a second – it's not that much less interesting than the competition (baby pics).

Good point, haven't thought of that. I guess Instagram is still in trouble because of the loss of eyeballs to TikTok. I've seen a few famous TikTokers advertising products at the end of their video. Maybe they could require taking a cut there. I guess they'll figure something out, that's why they hired all those facebook executives.

Re: ByteDance investors value TikTok at $50B in takeover bid

#196
post #14

Many are suggesting that TikTok would be overvalued at $50B. If that's the case, do you believe FB is overvalued at $662B? Instagram, as of 2018, was estimated to be worth around $100B on its own (with about 1b MAUs, versus TikTok's 800m). TikTok seems at least equally addictive, and its algorithm does a fantastic job at quickly showing good content that matches your interests.

Ofcourse Platform companies are overvalued. There is no real tech here just user content they are trying to monetize. Infact I would go ahead and say real tech was under valued look at Sun Microsystems, A company that Developed its own Processor (Sparc) , Its own OS (Solaris) , Its own Database (Mysql) , Its own VM (Virtual Box) , Its own Language and Development Platform (Java), Its own Development IDE (Netbeans) ev…

> And yet the company was sold at 1 Billion USD, which seemed like short change.

That was 2009 though, was 1B USD small compared to the average corporate acquisitions at the time?

Instagram was also sold for 1B if I recall correctly.

Re: ByteDance investors value TikTok at $50B in takeover bid

#197
post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

and how sketchy exactly is it?

https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/blog/tiktok-seems-to-b...

https://www.theverge.com/2020/7/3/21312821/linkedin-app-ios-...

This does not seem specific to tiktok at all. Would you jump in on discussions on LinkedIn and claim "Not surprised, given how sketchy LinkedIn is?"

Re: ByteDance investors value TikTok at $50B in takeover bid

#198
post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

and how sketchy exactly is it?

https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/blog/tiktok-seems-to-b...

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2020/06/tiktok-and-53-other-...

This article further shows the point I was trying to make: not saying tiktok is in the right here but the media focus on tiktok for the entire article and then tag on the full list of 32 apps towards the end of the article in bullet points.

Re: ByteDance investors value TikTok at $50B in takeover bid

#199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s still below its 2017 ipo price and its EBITDA is almost -$1B.

Snapchat IPO shares were priced at 17$. It's trading at 22.59 as I type this.

Sure it was shopped around at $17 but soared to $27 on it's first day and has been below that ever since

Re: ByteDance investors value TikTok at $50B in takeover bid

#200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They would never open the GFW because it would be a threat to their governance model.

Using proxy servers is quite common in China, to the point where internet cafes used to have instructions on how to do so. I wonder what percent of people are actually stymied by the gfw, versus minorly annoyed

[deleted]
Post reply on HN