ByteDance Appoints Julie Gao As New Chief Financial Officer

Julie Gao, ByteDance’s new Chief Financial Officer

Julie Gao has been appointed as Chief Financial Officer for TikTok’s parent company ByteDance. The announcement came in an internal memo the company sent to its employees on Monday. She will be taking over from Shou Zi Chow who relinquished the role of ByteDance’s CFO to focus on being TikTok’s CEO.

Shou Zi Chow joined ByteDance in March 2021 from smartphone company Xiaomi where he was the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of Xiaomi from 2015 to 2020 and was in charge of the company’s international business wing for a year. Just a few months after, in May, he took on the role of Chief Executive Officer at subsidiary company TikTok. Since then, he has worked tirelessly alongside various teams and executives to bring ByteDance and TikTok to where they presently are. He stepped down from his role as ByteDance’s CFO in November 2021.

Julie Gao who is currently a capital markets attorney at law firm Skadden and based in Hong Kong will be resuming her role as ByteDance’s CFO in May, according to inside sources. According to the memo sent by ByteDance’s CEO Liang Rubo, the new CFO will be based in Hong Kong and Singapore once she resumes office.

Julie Gao has been an integral part of both ByteDance and TikTok. She recommended the acquisition of Musical.ly which was fused into what is known as TikTok today. She also advised the acquisition of Shanghai-based gaming studio Moonton.

Last year, according to sources, ByteDance was aiming for an IPO by early 2022 but with the first quarter already gone, it looks like the company is not placing focus on the highly-anticipated IPO. Last year, reports had it that ByteDance was looking to list in Hong Kong after addressing Chinese regulators’ concerns.