President Donald Trump on Tuesday announced support for Oracle Corp. to buy the US operations of TikTok, adding a fresh wrinkle to the offering for the Chinese-owned video-sharing app.
Oracle ORCL,
is a new contractor in the negotiations for TikTok, whose owner ByteDance Ltd. a fall deadline for the Trump administration is set to disinvest itself from its U.S. operations. Oracle, a giant in enterprise software, has held preliminary talks on partnering with some of ByteDance’s existing minority investors to buy TikTok’s US operations, but it’s not clear how advanced the talks are, people familiar with the matter said.
Microsoft Corp. MSFT,
said earlier this month that it was in negotiations with ByteDance, and that it was coordinating with the White House. Twitter Inc. TWTR,
is also investigating a bid, The Wall Street Journal reported earlier. The Financial Times previously reported on Oracle’s involvement.
Oracle has closer ties to the White House than most other parties involved in bidding. Larry Ellison, the company’s co-founder, chairman and largest shareholder, threw a fundraiser at his president’s house earlier this year. Chief Executive Safra Catz also worked in 2016 on the executive committee for the Trump transition team.
Asked on Tuesday if Oracle would be a good buyer for TikTok, Trump said, “Well, I think Oracle is a great company and I think owner is a great man, a great person. I think Oracle would definitely be one of those it could work. “
An extended version of this report appears on WSJ.com.
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