- Last week, Trump said the U.S. government will ban TikTok unless the app can be sold to an American organization within 90 days
- Oracle and Microsoft – Walmart have emerged as the two front runners in the race to acquire the wildly popular video sharing app.
- Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison threw a campaign fundraising event for Trump earlier this year and has expressed his support for the president.
President Donald Trump said U.S. enterprise software giant Oracle is “a great company” when asked if if it would be a good buyer for TikTok.
His endorsement for Oracle, co-founded by billionaire Larry Ellison, comes after reports that the Californian tech firm is interested in buying TikTok’s North America, Australia and New Zealand businesses from Chinese parent company ByteDance.
Speaking at an event in Yuma, Arizona, Trump said: “Well, I think Oracle is a great company, and I think its owner is a tremendous guy. He’s a tremendous person. I think that Oracle would be certainly somebody that could handle it. Yeah. We gave them until September 15.”
Oracle is prepared to pay for TikTok but some of ByteDance’s investors value TikTok’s global business at $50 billion while Oracle has submitted a bit for about 20 – 30 Billion in stock and cash.
The way TikTok is structured means the subsidiaries in New Zealand, Canada, and Australia report to the U.S. and that’s why they’re being included in the deal talks.
Oracle’s bid for TikTok also involves U.S. venture capital firms Sequoia Capital and General Atlantic, which are investors in ByteDance.