China’s ByteDance is planning a US initial public offering of TikTok Global, the new company that will operate the popular short-video app, should its proposed deal be cleared by the US government
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US President Donald Trump raised questions on Wednesday about plans by China’s ByteDance to keep a majority stake in the US operations of popular social media platform TikTok.
ByteDance founder and CEO Yiming Zhang’s decision to drop his pursuit of a sale of TikTok’s US operations to Microsoft in favour of a partnership with Oracle was the culmination of weeks of pressure.
Six weeks after announcing to the world it was in talks to buy TikTok, Microsoft comes out to tell us it didn’t get the gig. CEO Satya Nadella dodged a bullet. Now the gun is aimed directly at Oracle and its chairman, Larry Ellison.
ByteDance abandoned the sale of TikTok in the US on Sunday to pursue a partnership with Oracle that it hopes will spare it a US ban while appeasing China’s government, people familiar with the matter said.
Beijing opposes a forced sale of TikTok’s US operations by its Chinese owner ByteDance, and would prefer to see the short-video app shut down in the US, people with knowledge of the matter said.
ByteDance is increasingly likely to miss a Trump administration deadline for the sale of its TikTok US operations after new Chinese regulations complicated negotiations with bidders Microsoft and Oracle.
US President Donald Trump insists that any sale of TikTok include a cut for the federal government, yet that demand has baffled policy experts and lawyers.
A group representing major Internet companies has urged a US regulator to reject a Trump administration bid to narrow the ability of social media companies to remove objectionable content.
Facebook on Tuesday told users it can take down or block any content that could increase regulatory or legal risks for the social media giant around the world – even if the content itself isn’t illegal.