Microsoft said Sunday that its offer to buy TikTok's U.S. operations had been rejected, one week before the Trump administration plans to ban the social video app if it continues to be owned by China-based ByteDance.
"We are confident our proposal would have been good for TikTok's users, while protecting national security interests," Microsoft said in a statement. A spokeswoman declined to comment on why the offer was rejected.
TikTok did not return a request for comment.
The Trump administration has put pressure on ByteDance to divest TikTok's U.S. operations due to national security issues. Trump has raised concerns about whether TikTok gives information about U.S. users to the Chinese government. TikTok says that it has not and that it stores its U.S. user data in Virginia and backs it up in Singapore.
Now that Microsoft is no longer in the running, that leaves Oracle as a potential buyer. On Sunday, the Wall Street Journal _ citing unidentified sources _ said that Oracle had been chosen as the "trusted tech partner" for TikTok in the U.S., but the paper indicated that that "deal is likely to not be structured as an outright sale."
A sale of TikTok's U.S. operations became more complicated when the Chinese government updated its export rules to require government approval for the sale of artificial intelligence, which many believe would include TikTok's algorithm.
Trump signed an executive order that would bar individuals or American companies from transactions with ByteDance's TikTok starting Sept. 20. Many analysts believe the order would cause TikTok to be removed from Apple and Google's mobile app stores in the U.S.
"TikTok's days in the U.S. likely are numbered, with a shutdown now the next step," Daniel Ives, an analyst with Wedbush Securities, said in a research note. "Unless some last minute changes, ByteDance heads into the White House deadline this week with some dark days ahead as the plug now likely gets pulled on the TikTok app within the US."
