Kelly Zhang

Chinese businesswoman
Kelly Zhang
OccupationBusiness executive
TitleCEO of ByteDance China

Kelly Zhang (Chinese: 张楠; pinyin: Zhāng Nán) is a Chinese businesswoman. She is the chief executive officer of ByteDance China. She is responsible for overseeing the operations and management of the company's China portfolio, including the video-sharing platform Douyin and the news aggregator Toutiao.[1][2]

Zhang was named in the Forbes list of The World's 100 Most Powerful Women in 2020,[3] and in the Fortune's Most Powerful Women International list in 2020 and 2021.[4][5]

Early life and career

Zhang studied painting as a child[6] and completed her university studies in 2003 with a degree in fine arts. After graduating, Zhang's first position was working on product planning and design for three years in Beijing at Digital Red, a mobile game studio.

In 2006, Zhang left Digital Red and began working at Qianchi Unlimited, a social media app developer.

In February 2013, Zhang founded a photo-sharing app called Tuba, which accumulated nearly 500,000 users in its first six months.

ByteDance

Tuba was acquired by ByteDance in 2014, where Zhang had begun working as a product manager.[1][7] Zhang was then put in charge of ByteDance's user-generated content business.[6] She has been credited for the success of Douyin, which was launched in September 2016, and was named the CEO of Douyin in March, 2018. During Zhang's tenure as Douyin's CEO, she worked to build Douyin's presence in Chinese cities by developing partnerships with international luxury fashion and sports brands.[1] Zhang was also responsible for other ByteDance brands such as Huoshan Video, photo editor Qingyan and video editor Jianying.[1]

In March 2020, Zhang became CEO of ByteDance's China business.[2][8] In January 2021, Zhang was responsible for the rollout of Douyin Pay, a built-in service to allow Douyin users to buy goods and services within the app.[5]

Awards and recognition

  • 2020: #62, Forbes list of The World's 100 Most Powerful Women[3]
  • 2020: #45, Fortune Most Powerful Women International[4]
  • 2021: #48, Fortune Most Powerful Women International[5]
  • 2021: #11, Forbes China 100 Top Businesswomen List[9][10]

References

  1. ^ a b c d Cortese, A. J. (2021-03-03). "Kelly Zhang is ByteDance's #2. How did she get there?". Kr-Asia.
  2. ^ a b Li, Shan; Kubota, Yoko (2020-03-12). "TikTok Owner Taps Two Executives to Run Its China Business". The Wall Street Journal.
  3. ^ a b Stoller, Kristin (2020-12-08). "From MacKenzie Scott to ByteDance's Kelly Zhang: Meet the Newcomers on the World's Most Powerful Women List 2020". Forbes.
  4. ^ a b "Kelly Zhang – 2020 Most Powerful Women International". Fortune. 2020-10-21.
  5. ^ a b c "Kelly Zhang – 2021 Most Powerful Women International". Fortune. 2021-10-06.
  6. ^ a b Zhao, Dongshan; Li, Wei (2021-04-09). 张楠：字节跳动二号位. China Entrepreneur Magazine (in Chinese).
  7. ^ Kong, Mingming (2013). 张楠：读图时代的兴趣交流社区. The Founder (in Chinese).
  8. ^ 张楠、张利东执掌中国区业务，字节跳动八周年迎来组织升级. Xinhua News Agency (in Chinese). 2020-03-12. Archived from the original on March 16, 2020.
  9. ^ 2021福布斯 中国杰出商界女性榜. Forbes China (in Chinese).
  10. ^ 福布斯中国发布商界女性创新力十人，致敬女性创新. Forbes China (in Chinese). 2021-02-23.