JAKARTA, June 14 Reuters China39;s ByteDance will lay off staff at its Indonesian unit following a deal where it bought a local ecommerce firm and combined it with its TikTok operation, a spokesperson said on Friday. ByteDance, the owner of TikTok, did not say how many employees would be affected. Bloomberg had earlier reported there would be 450 jobs cut.

In January ByteDance completed a deal to buy a majority stake in Tokopedia, an Indonesian ecommerce firm, from the GoTo group.

ByteDance spokesperson Nuraini Razak told Reuters in a statement the company would make necessary adjustments as a result of the combination of TikTok and Tokopedia.

We identified areas to strengthen our organisation and better align our teams with company goals, she said, adding the company would aim to support employees throughout this transition.

ByteDance had its own ecommerce operation in Indonesia via its TikTok app, but that was banned under an Indonesian rule that social media applications could not operate as an ecommerce platform.

Tokopedia is one of the leading ecommerce platforms in Southeast Asia39;s largest economy.

Reporting by Stefanno Sulaiman; Editing by John Mair

Source Reuters