Weeks after Microsoft announced a bid to acquire TikTok, cloud major Oracle has entered the race. According to a report in The Financial Times, Oracle “held preliminary talks with TikTok’s Chinese owner, ByteDance” and was “seriously considering purchasing the app’s operations in the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.”
According to the report, Oracle was working with a group of US investors that already own a stake in ByteDance, “including General Atlantic and Sequoia Capital.”
Oracle was yet to comment on the report.
Microsoft is the frontrunner to purchase TikTok’s US business following a discussion between the company’s CEO Satya Nadella and US President Donald Trump. Most recently, Trump issued an executive order to direct ByteDance to sell its TikTok business in the US within 90 days.
However, reports suggest the Microsoft-TikTok deal may not happen as odds of the deal are “not higher than 20 per cent.”
The earlier executive order from Trump prohibited the China-based company from doing business with the US firms after 45 days. TikTok has already threatened legal action against the first executive order.
The new executive order also authorised US officials to inspect TikTok and ByteDance to ensure the safety of personal data of nearly 80 million American users of the short video making app. Their US operations are estimated to value more than $20 billion.
In the past, Oracle’s chief technology officer and co-founder, Larry Ellison, has publicly expressed support for Trump. Many believe this could help the company with this deal amid Trump’s executive orders against the app.
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