The latest report said that TikTok, a short video platform owned by ByteDance, was preparing to accelerate its e-commerce expansion plan, or launched its in app shopping platform TikTok Shop in Spain and Ireland as early as October this year.

According to informed sources, in recent weeks, TikTok has notified its partners, including merchants and creator organizations, to prepare for the launch of TikTok Shop in the aforementioned two countries.

A TikTok spokesperson simply responded by stating that the company will "continue to explore this new business opportunity to support businesses of all sizes and enable our community to discover and use products they love.

TikTok Shop is the fastest feature within TikTok. This feature combines addictive video content with impulse shopping, distinguishing TikTok from competitors such as Instagram and YouTube, and adding revenue sources to the company.

According to informed sources, TikTok Shop has recruited a team of approximately 40 employees in Spain, making it one of the company's largest e-commerce bases in Europe. According to the recruitment information on TikTok website, the company is also recruiting Spanish speaking talents in Madrid and London to be responsible for logistics, compliance, and strategy for TikTok Shop.

It is worth noting that insiders said that the scale of TikTok Shop's initial launch in the two countries mentioned above should not be too large.

Previously, it was reported that TikTok's original plan was to introduce TikTok Shop to European countries such as Spain, Germany, Italy, France, and Ireland earlier this year, but the company ultimately postponed its expansion plan and instead delved deeper into the US market.

The United States remains TikTok's most important market, with approximately 170 million monthly active users on the app. It is reported that TikTok plans to increase its US commodity trading volume tenfold this year, reaching $17.5 billion.

But TikTok also faces some obstacles in the United States, including fierce market competition and "bans" on the software. However, the TikTok ban gives TikTok's parent company a ByteDance deadline that highly overlaps with the US election. This means that the outcome of the US election may affect the implementation of the ban. Republican presidential candidate Trump has stated that if he wins the election, he plans to no longer ban TikTok.

TikTok can breathe a sigh of relief before the results of the US election are announced. This may be an important reason why the company has started to put its European expansion plan on the agenda.

It is understood that Bob Kang, president of Tiktok E-commerce, is responsible for the global e-commerce business and focuses on the U.S. market of TikTok Shop. Kevin Chen, the former head of ByteDance's Toutiao application, is now responsible for the European market of TikTok Shop.