TikTok parent ByteDance has reportedly launched a new music streaming service in China, called Qishui Yinyue.
That’s according to the South China Morning Post, which reports that the app was launched last month.
ByeDance’s entrance into the music streaming sector in China marks the arrival of a new challenger to music platforms run by tech giants Tencent Holdings and NetEase.
This news follows reports from September 2021 that ByteDance was planning to launch a new music streaming service in China in 2021.
According to news outlet 36Kr, the music service was dubbed ‘Luna’ internally and was provisionally named ‘Feilo’.
At the time, 36Kr, which cited ‘multiple independent sources’, reported that the team behind Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok, was overseeing the build of the new app.
SCMP reports further that ByteDance’s new app Qishui Yinyue (meaning ‘soda music” in Mandarin), ‘operates in a similar way to Resso’
ByteDance launched a music streaming service and Spotify rival called Resso in India in March 2020.
Qishui Yinyue’s catalog currently features 10 million music tracks, and is “built on ByteDance’s personalisation algorithm”, according to SCMP’s report.
The app is currently in beta and an invitation code is required to use it.
SCMP notes that ByteDance’s expansion into the music streaming market in China follows the end of exclusive deals between labels and music streaming services in China last year.
Tencent Holdings and its majority-owned music arm Tencent Music Entertainment ended all exclusive deals held with global labels in China, after being hit with an exclusivity ban by China’s State Administration of Market Regulation (SAMR) in July.
“Soda Music is an app built on Douyin’s continuous efforts in music.”
Douyin representative, speaking to SMPC
In a statement provided to the South China Morning Post, a Douyin representative said: “Soda Music is an app built on Douyin’s continuous efforts in music.”
They added: “Douyin launched it as a stand-alone app to better serve our users as well as artists in the industry.”
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