This rumour was initially announced when the parent company behind TikTok, ByteDance, filed a trademark application with the US Patent and Trademark Office for a new venture called "TikTok Music". According to the application, the service is meant to allow users to purchase, play, share, and download music, songs, albums, and lyrics, among other value-added services.
While this trademark application was filed as early as the month of May, it is only now that the company is getting around to beginning talks with the major music distributors to discuss the possibility of such a venture formally. This will bring it in direct competition with established platforms like Spotify and Apple Music, in addition to its existing competitors in the social media space.
This isn't the company's first venture into this kind of business. They already operate a service called Resso, which follows a similar format. This service is currently only run in a handful of countries, including India, Brazil, and Indonesia. However, it isn't a fully monetized platform, despite the best efforts of the company.
In addition to serving users with mostly free music, the sub-brand also sponsors music festivals across various colleges and universities to drive up the user base. Efforts that have been quite fruitful for the company in the past. Unfortunately, they aren't really driving up the revenue. This is part of the reason why the Sony Group recently pulled their music content from the app in these regions.
Another reason was ByteDance's infamous habit of paying their content partners a minuscule share of their generated revenue, something that is already seen through their existing TikTok platform. This is despite the fact that they have more than 500 million active users worldwide. Most of them prefer the app only because of its vast collection of free licensed music. Only time will tell if they are able to retain this audience for their upcoming music streaming platform.
