Last week, news circulated that TikTok Shop was preparing for layoffs in the US market. A letter from Mu Qing was widely circulated: 

Over the past month, I have taken the opportunity to learn and evaluate how best to support US business in meeting the opportunities and challenges ahead of us. We have undergone careful analysis of how to create more efficient operating models for the team’s long-term growth and, as a result, will be communicating organizational and personnel changes to the E-Commerce US Operations, US Operations Center, and Global Key Accounts teams beginning early on Wednesday, May 21 (PT).

Our goal is to communicate with employees swiftly and with as much clarity as possible. All updates will be made via your company email, followed by HRBP outreach. To best facilitate these conversations, it is recommended that you work remotely on Wednesday, May 21.

We appreciate everyone’s patience and understanding as we navigate these difficult discussions. We are committed to supporting our teams throughout this transition with as much compassion and support as possible.


Many from the community asked us about our thoughts on the layoffs. Here are a few quick pointers: 

  1. According to TikTok Shop in the U.S. 2024 report jointly released by Momentum Works and Tabcut, TikTok Shop GMV in the US reached US$9 billion in 2024. While this made US the largest country for TikTok Shop by GMV, it was certainly below expectations of ByteDance leadership;
  2. While the most pressing issue was probably ROI (as ByteDance is a very data driven company), there are a few indicators we can see from the report: 
    a. only 10% of the GMV came from live;
    b. Only four livestreaming sessions in the US have surpassed USD $1 million in GMV. Amongst which the top one generated less than half of the GMV compared to the top session in Vietnam;
  3. And of course, the US cost structure would be very different from that of Vietnam. Earlier this month, a disgruntled former employee wrote a long article (in Chinese) complaining about all the inefficiencies in the US market. The article is now off the internet – but it surely reached the higher levels of ByteDance;
  4. Now with TikTok Shop launching across key countries in Europe and Latin America, and especially with some of the markets in Southeast Asia showing improving ROIs (and market share). The pressure on TikTok Shop’s US operations is evident;
  5. That’s probably why Mu Qing was put in charge. He was formerly the vice president of ecommerce for Douyin, and transferred to TikTok Shop US as the vice president of cross-border ecommerce. Since the restructuring in April, he currently takes the lead of the US operations for TikTok Shop;
  6. The restructuring and layoffs will probably last for a few rounds – we have seen this happening with other ByteDance subsidiaries (including Indonesia’s Tokopedia, which TikTok Shop acquired in 2023);
  7. Will the potential sale of TikTok in the US affect TikTok Shop operations? Less likely in our opinion – the tariffs probably have a bigger structural impact here.