The Emancipation Of TikTok

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What's going on?

TikTok, the worlds fastest-growing social media app, has until September 15th to get rid of its US segment and on Sunday, Microsoft told the company, we belong together.

What does this mean?

The US government has been making life difficult for TikTok since June, and has even threatened to ban the app citing national security concerns. And while Chinese parent company ByteDance would prefer not to lose the platform at all, itd rather it gets to live on even if that means a new majority owner.




Enter Microsoft: all it wants for August is to buy TikToks US, Canadian, Australian, and New Zealand segments from ByteDance, though theyre yet to agree on a price. And the tech giants likely hoping it can get a deal approved quickly: it wasnt involved in last weeks tech hearings, has said its willing to work with the US government on this, and has promised to bring back American users data which is currently being exported to China.

Why should I care?

The bigger picture: Heartbreaker.


Microsoft has been benefiting from corporate customers that spend big on its cloud products recently, but its purchase of TikTok could represent a shift towards consumer-facing products. The move could also spell more competition for Facebook and Snapchat, though the latters probably hoping the new music feature its just integrated into its app will keep it safe and sound. Plus, TikToks still not the advertising powerhouse that those rivals are but optimistic investors who sent the stock up 5% on Monday will be watching closely to see if Microsoft can change that.



Zooming out: Make it happen.


Big companies were striking deals left and right on Monday: Siemens Healthineers agreed to buy rival medical tech company Varian for $16 billion, 7-Elevens owner agreed to the $21 billion purchase of Marathons Speedway gas stations, and Google announced a $450 million investment in security firm ADT, whose stock jumped about 60% (tweet this).

Originally posted as part of the Finimize daily email.

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