TikTok rejects Microsoft bid at eleventh hour
Microsoft has said that its offer to buy the US operations of hugely popular video-sharing app TikTok has been rejected_ paving the way for Oracle to make a last-minute bid. US President Donald Trump gave a 15 September deadline for the Chinese-owned app to sell or shut down. The Trump administration claims TikTok and other Chinese apps are national security threats. Microsoft and Oracle led the race to buy TikTok from Chinese firm ByteDance. The Wall Street Journal and Reuters reported that Oracle_ which sells database technology and cloud systems to businesses_ had won the bidding war_ citing people familiar with the matter. Earlier reports had said Oracle was seriously considering buying TikTok's businesses in the US_ Canada_ Australia and New Zealand with investment firms_ including General Atlantic and Sequoia Capital. A TikTok spokesperson told the BBC the firm was "not commenting on either the Microsoft development nor the Oracle speculation". The Beijing-based firm had been in talks to divest the business to Oracle or a consortium led by Microsoft Corp MSFT.O after U.S. President Donald Trump ordered the sale last month and threatened to shut down the short-video app in the country. While TikTok is best known for dancing videos that go viral among teenagers_ U.S. officials are concerned user information could be passed to China s communist government. TikTok_ which has as many as 100 million U.S. users_ has said it would never share such data with Chinese authorities. On Monday_ China s state-run English television channel CGTN cited sources as saying ByteDance will not sell TikTok s U.S. operations to Oracle or Microsoft_ and will not give the source code for the platform to any U.S. firm. Under Bytedance s latest proposal_ Oracle will be the firm s technology partner and assume management of TikTok s U.S. user data_ sources told Reuters on Sunday. Oracle is also negotiating taking a stake in TikTok s U.S. operations_ they said.
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