Author | Meng XiaoFor more financial information | BT Finance Data ChannelThe article contains a total of 4,887 words and is expected to take 13 minutes to read

"Fourteen years ago, a programmer who hesitated to change his phone because he thought the iPhone was too expensive became the richest man in China."

Recently, the Hurun China Rich List updated its 2024 rankings, with ByteDance founder Zhang Yiming topping the list with a net worth of 350 billion yuan, sparking heated discussions on social media. Nongfu Spring's Zhong Shanshan lost his title as the richest man for the first time in three consecutive years. According to the Hurun China Rich List, Zhong Shanshan's net worth is 340 billion yuan, 10 billion yuan less than Zhang Yiming's. Zhang Yiming's net worth increased by 43% in 2024, while Zhong Shanshan's shrank by 24%.

Among the top 10 richest individuals, most saw their net worth decline, with Zhong Shanshan experiencing the largest drop of 110 billion yuan. Following him was Zeng Yuqun, the founder of Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. Limited (CATL), whose net worth decreased by 20%. Six out of the top 10 saw a decline in their net worth, with Alibaba's Ma family experiencing the smallest drop of 3%. Four individuals saw an increase in their wealth, with Tencent's Pony Ma, the He family of Midea Group, and the Lee family of Henderson Land Development all recording growth rates of 13%, 18%, and 9% respectively, all falling short of Zhang Yiming's impressive 43% increase.

From the Hurun China Rich List data, we can see that Zhang Yiming, thanks to platforms like Douyin and TikTok, increased his wealth by 105 billion yuan in just one year, surpassing Li Xiting of Mindray Medical and ranking 25th on the list with this additional wealth alone. Since the inception of the Hurun China Rich List in 1999, Zhang Yiming has become the 18th richest man in China in 26 years and the first post-80s billionaire. With ByteDance's solidified position as a global unicorn, Wall Street investment banks even believe he has the potential to become the world's richest man.

Rupert Hoogewerf, Chairman of Hurun Report, said, "Zhang Yiming is the 18th richest man in China over the past 26 years. During the same period, only four Americans—Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Jeff Bezos, and Elon Musk—have taken turns as the richest man in the United States. This demonstrates the enormous vitality of China's private economy." It is worth mentioning that ByteDance is not a publicly traded company. Once ByteDance goes public, Zhang Yiming could potentially become the world's richest man.

1

One IPO Away from Becoming the World's Richest Man

Based on Zhang Yiming's current net worth of 350 billion yuan, which is approximately 49.4 billion dollars, he ranks around 20th globally. Elon Musk, with a net worth of 256.5 billion dollars (1.67 trillion yuan) according to the Hurun Global Rich List, has reclaimed the title of the world's richest man for the third time in four years. The wealth gap between Zhang Yiming and the world's richest man is approximately 200 billion dollars.

While this gap may seem immense, a closer look at Zhang Yiming's wealth growth rate reveals that the gap is not insurmountable. In 2016, Zhang Yiming ranked 1903rd on the Hurun China Rich List with a net worth of only 2 billion yuan, tied with 154 others. This means that in 2016, Zhang Yiming was approximately in the 2000th position overall.

In 2017, as Douyin's daily active users soared, Zhang Yiming's personal wealth also skyrocketed, increasing by 1350% year-on-year to 29 billion yuan, catapulting him over 1800 positions to 83rd place. Although there was still a significant gap with Ma Yun, the richest man that year with a net worth of 270 billion yuan, Zhang Yiming had truly entered the ranks of the Hurun China Rich List. In 2018, Zhang Yiming's wealth continued to multiply, growing to 65 billion yuan, an increase of 124% year-on-year, and ranking 26th. For two consecutive years, he was the entrepreneur with the fastest wealth growth on the list. In 2019, he ranked 20th with a net worth of 95 billion yuan, surpassing 100 billion yuan in 2020 and directly exceeding 340 billion yuan in 2021. From 2 billion to 340 billion yuan, Zhang Yiming achieved this growth in just five years, a pace unmatched by any other individual on the global rich list.

Even after Zhang Yiming announced his "retirement" in 2021, his personal wealth continued to rise, culminating in his ascent to the throne of China's richest man with a net worth of 350 billion yuan in 2024, demonstrating the rapid growth of his wealth. Of course, this is directly related to ByteDance's performance and high valuation.

According to foreign media reports, ByteDance generated revenue of 110 billion dollars in 2023, a year-on-year increase of 30%, equivalent to approximately 784.3 billion yuan, surpassing Tencent's revenue of 609 billion yuan. ByteDance has not responded to these reports. According to The Information, ByteDance's revenue in the second quarter of 2023 was 29 billion dollars, a year-on-year increase of over 40%. Revenue for the first half of 2023 was approximately 54 billion dollars. In 2022, ByteDance generated 85 billion dollars in revenue. According to Tencent's financial report for the same period, its revenue for the first half of 2023 was 299.2 billion yuan (approximately 41.3 billion dollars). ByteDance's advertising revenue in 2023 was 400 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 40%, approaching the combined volume of Alibaba and Tencent. It is not unfounded to suggest that ByteDance's revenue exceeds that of Tencent.

In 2024, ByteDance's performance declined slightly. According to LatePost, ByteDance's quarterly advertising revenue growth rate in China fell from around 40% to 17% in the first three quarters of this year. Even at this growth rate, its advertising business volume still far exceeds that of Tencent and Alibaba. This has also pushed ByteDance's valuation to over 300 billion dollars. In 2021, some media outlets reported a valuation as high as 500 billion dollars. After eight rounds of financing (nine rounds including the seed round), ByteDance has become a global unicorn giant, with Xiniu Data providing a valuation of 100 billion dollars as early as 2020.

Using a conservative valuation of 300 billion dollars, according to Qichacha data, the company's actual controller Zhang Yiming holds a 98.1% stake in ByteDance, while the company's executive director Zhang Lidong holds a 1.19% stake. Zhang Yiming's net worth is close to 300 billion dollars. However, according to a previous Fortune magazine report, a lawsuit filed by TikTok against the U.S. government revealed that ByteDance's equity distribution is 21% held by Zhang Yiming, 58% by global institutions (such as BlackRock, General Atlantic, SIG), and 21% by ByteDance employees (including 7,000 Americans). Although Zhang Yiming currently resides in Singapore, the documents indicate that he remains a Chinese citizen. If we consider his 21% stake, it will be difficult for Zhang Yiming to surpass Musk as the world's richest man in the short term.

However, ByteDance's revenue now comes not only from domestic advertising and e-commerce but also from TikTok, which has grown rapidly in overseas markets and become a significant revenue driver. As the world's largest short video platform, TikTok is also expected to further boost ByteDance's valuation.

Once ByteDance goes public as a whole, it is expected to become the company with the highest market value in China, given that some institutions have already provided a valuation of 3.2 trillion yuan. This means that whether Zhang Yiming can become the world's richest man depends on ByteDance's market value.

2

Nearly 1,300 Days of Focusing on AI

In May 2021, Zhang Yiming unexpectedly announced his retirement in a company-wide letter, handing over management responsibilities to Liang Rubo. In the letter, Zhang Yiming expressed his desire to step away from daily management tasks and focus on long-term, critical issues such as vision strategy, corporate culture, and social responsibility. From the perspective of the past three and a half years since Zhang Yiming's departure, it appears that his vision strategy and long-term priorities may lie in the field of AI large models.

BT Finance has discovered that Zhang Yiming may currently be shifting his focus to AI large models. A source close to Zhang Yiming said that he regularly reviews the progress of ByteDance's AI initiatives. When new projects emerge, he pays close attention. According to multiple media reports, Zhang Yiming has recently been intensively reading a series of papers from OpenAI, often staying up late to do so. Additionally, according to LatePost, citing insiders, Zhang Yiming frequently shares his insights from these papers and his thoughts on ChatGPT with some ByteDance management.

In previous interviews, Zhang Yiming described himself as someone who enjoys contemplating theoretically possible but as-yet-unrealized scenarios. His interest in AI may have been sown long ago. In an internal letter, he mentioned cutting-edge technologies such as virtual reality (VR), life sciences, and scientific computing, believing that "we need to break through the inertia of our business to explore these areas." Even though Zhang Yiming has retired, whether he holds a 98% or 21% stake, he remains ByteDance's de facto majority shareholder and can significantly influence the company's development.

In September 2021, ByteDance acquired PICO through a combination of cash and equity. Founded in 2015, PICO, which specializes in VR all-in-one devices, was a leading VR equipment manufacturer in China at the time. It is reported that ByteDance spent nearly 10 billion yuan to outbid Tencent in the acquisition. After the acquisition, ByteDance Tilt funds and resources towards PICO, even going so far as to use the entire Douyin platform to drive traffic. However, due to issues such as an immature market, a relatively weak software ecosystem, and non-rigid demand, PICO's performance has been underwhelming, dampening Zhang Yiming's VR dreams.

At the end of 2022, ChatGPT emerged, attracting the attention of global technology companies to AI large models. Many well-known technology companies entered the field, and Zhang Yiming may have shifted his focus to the popular AI large models at this time. In August 2023, ByteDance launched the popular Doubao. In addition to a series of basic models, Doubao offers over 20 AI large model apps for consumers, covering various segments such as chatbots, office assistants, code generation, text-to-image, and text-to-video. To date, Doubao's total downloads have reached 100 million, with 26 million monthly active users. In the Apple App Store and major Android app markets, Doubao ranks first in downloads among AIGC apps.

According to the Science and Technology Innovation Board Daily, on September 2, ByteDance acquired Oladance, an open-ear headphone brand, for 50 million dollars. Founded in 2019 by Li Haoqian, a former executive of headphone manufacturer BOSE, Oladance's latest initiative is the development of wearable devices. One investor described Oladance as having "discovered innovative interactive gameplay for headphones." This acquisition introduced a team of experienced former Bose engineers.

Over a month after the acquisition, on October 11, ByteDance launched the Ola Friend, an AI smart earphone priced at 1199 yuan. When users wear the 6.6-gram earphone, they can activate Doubao for dialogue simply by shouting the keywords "Doubao, Doubao" without needing to unlock their phones. This feature provides assistance in information inquiry, travel, English learning, emotional communication, and other scenarios. ByteDance's launch of this smart earphone once again confirms the company's ambitions in the field of AI hardware.

This year marks the third year of AI large model development, with accelerated application deployment. New AI hardware products such as AI phones and AI earphones are emerging. It is crucial to determine which will become the first entry point for user interaction with artificial intelligence in the AI era. While ByteDance's Ola Friend smart earphones have not yet garnered significant market response, they represent an important step forward.

This may be the significance of Zhang Yiming's three and a half years of research on AI large models behind the scenes. Some industry insiders even refer to AI large models as Zhang Yiming's "second venture".

3

Wise in Selecting Talent, Repeatedly Creating Traffic Miracles

If Zhang Yiming's wealth accumulation is a miracle of self-made success, it is inseparable from the traffic miracles he has created.

Zhou Shouzi, who joined from Xiaomi, did not disappoint Zhang Yiming. While ByteDance did not disclose the amount spent to recruit Zhou Shouzi, we can infer the approximate amount from the fact that Zhou Shouzi directly rejected Lei Jun's offer of 100 million shares in Xiaomi. Considering Xiaomi's share price at the time, the value of 100 million shares was at least 2 billion yuan, and it is now approximately 3 billion yuan. What Lei Jun finds most unforgettable is that Zhou Shouzi was groomed as his successor.

Previously, Zhou Shouzi was not well-known outside the industry. However, his charm was showcased to the world during the 2023 U.S. congressional hearing on TikTok. As TikTok's CEO, Zhou Shouzi faced aggressive questioning from representatives of 50 U.S. states during a five-hour inquiry, responding with precise and eloquent answers, demonstrating unyielding integrity. His "verbal battle" greatly enhanced ByteDance's reputation.

Before Zhou Shouzi took over as TikTok's CEO, the position had changed hands five times in five years due to international capital pressures. Zhou Shouzi was appointed under critical circumstances. Under his leadership, TikTok has developed rapidly in Southeast Asia, with 157 million users in Indonesia and over 100 million daily active users, covering 40% of Indonesia's population. This makes Indonesia TikTok's largest user base globally, surpassing the United States. Furthermore, in the first half of 2024, the Gross Merchandise Volume (GMV) of TikTok Shop Indonesia reached 16.3 billion dollars, making it the second-largest e-commerce platform in Indonesia after Shopee and poised to become the country's top e-commerce platform, especially as its main competitor Temu has been rejected in Indonesia.

In fact, TikTok entered the Southeast Asian market relatively late, but it has caught up and surpassed at an astonishing speed. The Gross Merchandise Volume (GMV) of TikTok in Southeast Asia reached approximately $16.3 billion in 2023, with an annual growth rate exceeding 27 times, an unprecedented growth rate in the region. TikTok's total share in the Southeast Asian e-commerce market reached about 13.2% in 2023, up from 4.4% in 2022, achieving a fourfold increase in GMV within a year.

In addition to TikTok, Lemon8, another lifestyle app under ByteDance, has long occupied the top spot in the lifestyle category for downloads on US IOS devices since September. Lemon8, considered the "overseas version of Xiaohongshu," a social media platform that blends elements of Pinterest, TikTok, and Instagram, has gradually won the favor of American users, becoming their new favorite for sharing lifestyles and ranking among the top ten in the US App Store downloads. ByteDance has reduced the risk of over-reliance on TikTok in overseas markets.

Zhang Yiming knows how to recognize and utilize talent, which not only laid a solid foundation for TikTok's overseas development but also laid the groundwork for him to become China's richest man and potentially the world's richest man in the future.

When resigning as CEO of ByteDance, Zhang Yiming said he hoped to "create more possibilities for the company within a decade." It has only been just over three years, and he has already become China's richest man. Under Zhang Yiming's talent management, ByteDance's development speed has far surpassed its industry competitors, especially its rise in overseas markets, which not only helps to maintain his position as China's richest man but also facilitates a challenge for the title of the world's richest man.

However, for Zhang Yiming, he may not aspire to be the richest man but rather a programmer. Recent media exposure also reveals that he is more fascinated and delighted by delving into large models than by news of the Hurun Rich List.