ByteDance is testing food delivery service via its Chinese version of TikTok

ByteDance told CNBC connected Wednesday that it has been investigating a benignant of nutrient transportation work successful China via its abbreviated video app Douyin, perchance pitting itself against large e-commerce companies similar Alibaba and Meituan.

And the institution is present considering extending the work beyond the trial.

Douyin is the Chinese mentation of TikTok which are some owned by ByteDance.

A Douyin spokesperson said that the institution has been "testing a diagnostic successful Beijing, Shanghai and Chengdu that enables merchants to beforehand and merchantability 'group-buying' packages to Douyin users successful these prime cities and person them delivered."

Restaurant owners often livestream connected Douyin to marketplace their business. While doing this, they tin connection discounts and coupons for their nutrient to users watching the videos. Multiple users tin past acquisition that connection and take a clip wrong 2 days for the nutrient to arrive.

The exemplary is precise antithetic from Meituan and Alibaba's Ele.me which are some on-demand nutrient transportation services, overmuch similar Uber Eats.

"We would see expanding the diagnostic to much cities successful the aboriginal depending connected the investigating results. There is nary elaborate timeline yet," a Douyin spokesperson said.

The institution has been investigating the diagnostic since December.

China's nutrient transportation manufacture is dominated by Meituan and Ele.me.

But ByteDance's tentative steps into the marketplace suggests it wants a portion of the market, which was worthy $66.4 cardinal successful 2022, according to probe steadfast IMARC Group.

ByteDance has been dipping its toes into antithetic areas of online shopping. Last year, the institution launched a manner website called If Yooou extracurricular of China.