TikTok owner buys stake in InnoStar Semiconductor
Social media firm ByteDance, owner of TikTok, has bought into InnoStar to help the memory chip developer boost production of its virtual reality tech.
The deal was actually conducted by Picoheart, the Singapore-based affiliate of ByteDance that specialises in VR tech. Filings show it purchased a 9.5 per cent shareholding in InnoStar, which is headquartered in Shanghai “in hopes of utilising the memory chips produced by InnoStar in Pico’s VR headsets”.
InnoStar specialises in resistive random access memory (ReRAM) chips, which provide lower power consumption and faster storage retention capability. The motivation behind the deal is rumoured to be based on VR. ByteDance is hugely successful in social media, but is aware of the potential for VR/AR to define the next iteration of the sector – given Meta's ownership of Oculus and Apple's launch of Vision Pro.
With this deal ByteDance becomes the third-largest shareholder of InnoStar, behind Memris Asia Pacific (28.8%) and Shanghai Alliance Investment (26.3%).
