TikTok Officially Says No to Microsoft, Takeover Fails

The September 15 deadline for the TikTok is almost here, and the Chinese company could end up shutting down in the United States if the deal with Microsoft doesn’t go through.

The officials involved in the takeover talks have remained completely tight-lipped lately, but we still found out that in addition to Microsoft, other parties have been interested in buying TikTok too, such as Oracle and a group of companies that included Google parent firm Alphabet.

While Microsoft has remained in pole-position to purchase TikTok, the September 15 deadline is just around the corner, and according to an announcement today, the deal won’t go through.

“ByteDance let us know today they would not be selling TikTok’s US operations to Microsoft. We are confident our proposal would have been good for TikTok’s users, while protecting national security interests. To do this, we would have made significant changes to ensure the service met the highest standards for security, privacy, online safety, and combatting disinformation, and we made these principles clear in our August statement. We look forward to seeing how the service evolves in these important areas,” Microsoft announced.

China doesn’t agree with the deal

In the meantime, more information has emerged from China, where the TikTok takeover isn’t very well received. A report from Reuters revealed that the Beijing government would rather see TikTok giving up on its American operations rather than allow a potential takeover.

Microsoft originally promised it would move all data of American users in the United States in an attempt to comply with privacy requirements.

“Microsoft would ensure that all private data of TikTok’s American users is transferred to and remains in the United States. To the extent that any such data is currently stored or backed-up outside the United States, Microsoft would ensure that this data is deleted from servers outside the country after it is transferred,” the company says.

More information on the future of TikTok in the United States should be shared soon.