ByteDance plans to spend $23B on AI in 2026, FT reports

TikTok owner ByteDance is set to expand its outlay on AI next year, with the company making preliminary plans to spend $23B, or RMB 160B, in capital expenditure in 2026, Zijing Wu and Ryan McMorrow of The Financial Times reports, citing two people with knowledge of the matter. More than half of the total will be spent on acquiring advanced semiconductors to develop AI models and applications, the sources added. This is an increase from the RMB 150B invested in AI in 2025. Oracle (ORCL), Silver Lake, and Abu Dhabi-based MGX will collectively own 45% of the U.S. entity under a deal set to close on January 22, while nearly a third of the company will be held by affiliates of current ByteDance investors, and almost 20% will be retained by ByteDance. Publicly traded companies in the social media space include Meta Platforms (META), Pinterest (PINS), Reddit (RDDT) and Snap (SNAP).