Beijing Bytedance Technology, the China-based owner of news aggregation app Toutiao, is looking to raise up to $1bn in new funding, the Wall Street Journal reported yesterday.
Bytedance, which is backed by social media company Sina Weibo, could reportedly secure the capital at a valuation of more than $10bn, but the report did not identify any prospective investors.
Launched in 2012, Toutiao analyses data from a user’s social media accounts and provides them with news fitted to their interests. Bytedance claimed Toutiao had roughly 600 million users and 66 million active daily users as of October 2016, and it makes a good deal of its revenue from targeted advertising.
The company also owns an English language app called TopBuzz and will put the funding toward international expansion. It led the $25m round closed by India-based media aggregation platform Dailyhunt last month.
Bytedance previously raised $100m in a mid-2014 series C round led by venture capital firm Sequoia Capital and backed by Sina Weibo that valued it at $500m.
SIG China, a subsidiary of trading and technology firm Susquehanna International Group, and Yuri Milner, founder of internet company Mail.Ru and investment firm DST Global, reportedly supplied Bytedance’s series A and B funding, though no precise details have been disclosed.