According to Bloomberg, ByteDance has abandoned plans to sell Shanghai Moonton Technology Co., Ltd. and plans to appoint a new CEO for the game studio.
Moonton Technology Co., Ltd. is ByteDance’s most valuable gaming company. ByteDance initially acquired it to challenge Tencent Holdings. Media said that the new CEO of Manyong Technology is Zhang Yunfan, former CEO of Perfect World. He will replace Yuan Jing, co-founder and CEO of Manyong Technology.
As ByteDance was rationalizing and restructuring its gaming division, the company’s management decided to change strategy and not sell Moonton Technology – which was acquired three years ago at a valuation of 4 billion USD. Bloomberg reported in March this year that ByteDance would focus its remaining gaming business on user-generated gaming content as this better fits the company’s platform-based strategy.
Previously, ByteDance had not made much progress in challenging giants like Tencent and NetEase in the gaming sector. As part of a broader cost-cutting effort in the gaming business, ByteDance initially considered selling Moonton in an attempt to refocus its business on core products such as Douyin and TikTok. Both Douyin and TikTok are growing rapidly in adjacent areas such as advertising revenue and e-commerce. After cutting hundreds of game development jobs and terminating several projects, ByteDance appointed Huawei’s former human resources chief in March to run its much-shrinking games unit.
Before joining ByteDance, Zhang Yunfan held various positions at Perfect World Company, including chief operating officer. It is currently unclear whether Yuan Jing will stay at Moonton Technology or not. Yuan Jing founded Mutong Technology 10 years ago and led the company to surpass former boss Tencent in the fighting game genre in the Southeast Asian market.
Since acquiring Manyong Technology in 2021, ByteDance has allowed the studio to operate almost autonomously, but the appointment of Zhang Yunfan could mark a change in strategy. Recently, Moon Technology has not been able to launch any new 3A products. In April last year, Mobile Legends: Bang Bang was approved to launch in China, but the domestic market has long been dominated by Tencent’s Honor of Kings, making it difficult for Moonton’s MOBA game to win. . Up to this point, a spokesperson for Moonton Technology refused to comment on personnel changes. A ByteDance spokesperson also did not respond to a request for comment.