Mobile Phone News

TikTok picks Oracle over Microsoft as possible U.S. suitor

by
Zaylee Amalia
09/14/2020

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With Tuesday’s deadline, Tiktok’s parent company, Byte Dance, will be forced to withdraw from U.S. operations or be banned in the state. Reuters reports A team led by Oracle, a US technology company, has chosen to buy the US version of the very popular app for an undisclosed price. Moments before the announcement of the winner of the Oracle competition, Microsoft said that Byte Dance had announced that it would not be selling the TicTac software giant. The company is initially ahead in a deal valued at $ 20 billion and above.

Oracle wins battle for U.S. operations in Tiktok

Walmart was also expected to be part of the Microsoft bid, and it is unclear if the retailer is still interested in TicTac. Announcing its withdrawal from the fight for US operations in Tiktok, Microsoft said: “We are confident that our proposal will protect Tiktok users while protecting national security interests. To do this, we made significant changes to ensure the service meets the highest standards for security, privacy, online security, and the fight against misinformation, and we explained these principles in our August statement. We look forward to seeing how the service expands in these important areas.

Acquired by Oracle, a U.S. operations company in Tiktok

With more than 2 billion installations worldwide, there are 100 million per month in the provinces of Tiktok, up from 11 million in early 2018. This app, which has a large number of teenage users, shows 15 or 60 seconds of community-created videos. Content includes lip sync, jokes, dancing and more. During the plague, when young people and others were confined to their homes, ticks became more popular than ever. Because of that popularity, the Trump administration was concerned that the Communist Chinese government could obtain personal information from Tiktok users and send it to Beijing. Byte Dance says Tiktok operates in the United States with only two clients, one in the provinces and the other in Singapore. The next step is to get approval from the US Foreign Investment Commission (CFIUS) and the White House deal. People familiar with the transaction say it should satisfy some participants’ fears about the security of data obtained by Tiktok in the United States.

China made the last-minute submission to the deal after the Chinese government added new export restrictions, barring the US from receiving certain information created by artificial intelligence. This algorithm is used by Tiktok users to determine which videos they want to watch and what they consider to be the “secret sauce” of the app, believing they are part of the transaction negotiations. On August 6, President Trump issued an executive order calling for a 45-day reversal of Tiktok’s call for a ban on Tiktok’s U.S. operations. The White House views the term as a national security threat.

Microsoft, as we mentioned earlier, was initially the front-runner and decided to accept Walmart as a partner. The original plan called for both Australia, Canada and New Zealand to acquire operations in Tiktok in the United States. In order for the deal to be finalized, Bite Dance must obtain approval from the U.S. and Chinese governments.

This is not the first time the U.S. government has been involved in a chaotic takeover of China. In March 2018, Singaporean chip maker Broadcom blocked the purchase of $ 117 billion worth of Snapdragon chip maker Qualcomm by the president. The U.S. was concerned that the deal would weaken Qualcomm by giving power to China. A few months later, Qualcomm’s attempt to acquire Dutch company NXP Semiconductor NV was blocked by Chinese no – confidence regulators.

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