Photographer: Chona Kasinger / Bloomberg
Photographer: Chona Kasinger / Bloomberg
Oracle Corp. has held preliminary talks with ByteDance Ltd. about a potential bid for part of TikTok’s business, and trying to river Microsoft Corp in the race to get the viral video streaming app, the Financial Times reported.
The company, led by billionaire Larry Ellison, is working with TikTok’s US investors, including General Atlantic and Sequoia Capital, to raise a bid for the app’s operations in the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, the FT said, with indication of people who informed about the matter.
Oracle’s entry could challenge Microsoft’s negotiating position, as the company at Redmond had been the only party to publicly confirm it was in talks with ByteDance. President Donald Trump on Friday released ByteDance to sell its U.S. assets within 90 days, adding to an earlier executive order that would ban U.S. individuals and companies from doing business with TikTok effectively 45 days from August 6th.
Oracle did not respond immediately and ByteDance declined to comment when contacted by Bloomberg.
Oracle co-founder Ellison is one of the few Silicon Valley moguls to openly support Trump. The billionaire, whose business was once among the sector’s most aggressive assets, has a fundraiser host on his estate for the US president. Oracle – the second largest software maker in the world – is focused on delivering to business customers and has almost no investment in consumer apps or social media.
Valued at roughly $ 166 billion, Oracle held about $ 43 billion in cash as close equivalents at the end of May, making it one of the few companies that could potentially pay the high price for TikTok. Analysts and bankers have the value of the TikTok U.S. company at between $ 20 billion and $ 50 billion, a broad range that reflects the complexity involved in separating TikTok U.S. and global companies.
– With the help of Zheping Huang, and Nico Grant
(Adds details about Ellison, Oracle from the fourth graph.)
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