TikTok parent company ByteDance might be quietly working on a new project outside of its app development  - a smartphone.

A report from the Financial Times details a new project in the works, confirmed by two anonymous sources familiar with it.

ByteDance's plan involves releasing a phone with its own apps pre-installed, which should encourage buyers that already use TikTok. The company also owns the news app Jinri Toutiao, as well as Chinese TikTok clone Douyin and messaging app Flipchat, but it's not certain if these apps will make it on to the product.

The mobile market

The report from the Financial Times states, “ByteDance’s latest project, the brainchild of founder Zhang Yiming, follows its acquisition of a number of patents from Smartisan, a Chinese phone maker, and subsequent recruitment of some of its staff,"

"Mr Zhang has long dreamt of a phone with ByteDance apps pre-installed, according to one person with knowledge of the secretive project.”

Other companies like ByteDance have also tried their hand at entering the phone market; Amazon trialed a Fire Phone back in 2015 which flopped just over a year after launch. Facebook also planned to launch a phone back in 2014 but was also unsuccessful. ByteDance may have the opportunity to be the first to do this successfully.