YouTube’s Chief Business Officer on TikTok, Shopping and Future Deals

As YouTube’s chief business officer, Robert Kyncl oversees global partnerships with media companies, artists and creators. Those internet personalities are starting to gravitate to a product YouTube rolled out nearly a year ago: a quick and easy way to produce short-form videos, like the ones popularized by TikTok. 

“That was a missing format for us,” Kyncl said in an interview with The Information. “We were missing the easy-to-use, low table-stakes format. That’s very critical to the next generation of creators who are coming up.”