TikTok has made a big deal about its business in the U.S. The deal gives a group of American and foreign investors most of the company’s stock. ByteDance in China owns the company.
This planned move, made before a government deadline, ends years of uncertainty and ensures that millions of American users can use the popular short-form video app. This new group will establish new data security rules to address long-standing national security concerns raised by U.S. officials.
The new owners of TikTok and its strategic partners
According to Engadget, the most important thing about this deal is that the company will have a new owner. ByteDance, the company that owns TikTok, has sold most of its shares in the new U.S. company and now only owns 20% of it. A group of investors from outside of China now owns the other 80%.
Three big companies run the group: Oracle, a tech company; Silver Lake, an investment firm; and MGX, an investment firm owned by the Emirati state. Now, each of these partners has a 15% stake in the new business. Michael Dell is the CEO of Dell and also an investor through his company.
This deal ends long talks and meets a deadline set by the US government. The US government threatened to ban TikTok unless it sold ByteDance. The deal directly stops that threat, which means that the app’s huge community of users and creators can keep going.
The new joint venture will run TikTok’s business in the US
The new joint venture has set up some operational protections that only apply to the U.S. market. Keeping data safe is one of the most important things to them. Oracle’s secure U.S. cloud environment will keep American users’ information safe, according to TikTok.
The group will also use data from the U.S. to retrain the platform’s content recommendation algorithm and will be in charge of moderating content in the U.S. The company has also promised to keep interoperability, which means that users will still be able to get content from other countries, and creators will still be able to reach people all over the world.
These new protections will apply to more than just the main TikTok app in the U.S. These protections will also extend to its affiliated apps, including CapCut and Lemon8. A board of directors with seven members will run the business. It will have Shou Chew, the CEO of TikTok, and leaders from Oracle, Silver Lake, and MGX. Most of the members will be from the United States.
