TikTok's future could be sealed in the relatively near future. In a speech cited by Reuters, Donald Trump recently said his administration was in contact with four potential buyers, all determined to get their hands on the platform.
To put things in context, this situation has emerged largely because of political and economic tensions between China and the United States. ByteDance, the firm behind the app, is indeed based in China. A situation that was obviously not to the government's liking, concerned about a potential "national security" problem and keen to limit the cultural influence that its rival was beginning to acquire on its own territory through this immensely popular application. The Biden administration therefore gave the company an ultimatum: sell the social network to an American entity, or forget about this market.
More than just a transaction
At In many ways, TikTok’s future is more than just a business issue: it’s a matter fraught with technical and geopolitical implications — and not just for the United States. To quote Forbes, whatever the outcome, the resolution of the situation "will likely be a turning point in how democratic nations handle technology assets with potential national security implications." This techno-political saga could therefore have repercussions all over the world, including in Europe.
The whole question is therefore to know who could possibly recover the social network, even if the Chinese camp continues to affirm that it would prefer to leave the United States than to give in to what he describes as “Forbes, it is none other than Frank McCourt, owner of the Dodgers, the legendary baseball team from Los Angeles... and Olympique de Marseille, of which he bought 95% in 2016.
As for the other three, the mystery remains. But it is very likely that at least a few tech giants will be in the running. It’s hard to imagine that companies like Meta or Microsoft, for example, wouldn’t be interested in the prospect of gaining direct access to over 170 million monthly users in the United States alone. Previous rumors also mentioned the famous YouTuber Mr. Beast.
However, we’ll have to wait until April 5, the deadline for negotiations, to hope to learn more. When the time comes, it will also be interesting to see whether this initiative, whatever its outcome, will give European regulators any ideas.
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