Business | Island shopping

TikTok is wading into South-East Asia’s e-commerce wars

Battered incumbents brace for a costly fight

Shou Zi Chew, TikTok’s boss, is pictured during the TikTok Southeast Asia Impact Forum 2023.
Image: Zulkarnain/Xinhua/Eyevine

IN MARCH TIKTOK’S chief executive, Shou Zi Chew, faced angry lawmakers in Washington, who grilled him for five hours on topics ranging from misinformation to mental health. A threat of a ban in America, the short-video app’s largest market, looms large. Other Western governments are making similar noises. TikTok, which is owned by a Chinese firm called ByteDance, has already been locked out of India, another big market, since 2020 on grounds of national security.

This article appeared in the Business section of the print edition under the headline “Island shopping”

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