Photo: Alamy
TikTok announced Thursday that its parent company, ByteDance, has finalized an agreement with a group of non-Chinese investors to establish a new, U.S.-based version of the popular social media platform.
President Trump celebrated the win in a post to his Truth Social account on Thursday.
“I am so happy to have helped in saving TikTok! It will now be owned by a group of Great American Patriots and Investors, the Biggest in the World, and will be an important Voice. Along with other factors, it was responsible for my doing so well with the Youth Vote in the 2024 Presidential Election,” the president wrote.
“I only hope that long into the future I will be remembered by those who use and love TikTok. Thank you to Vice President JD Vance, and all of the others within my Administration, who helped bring this Deal to a very dramatic, final, and beautiful conclusion. I would also like to thank President Xi, of China, for working with us and, ultimately, approving the Deal. He could have gone the other way, but didn’t, and is appreciated for his decision,” he added.
The investor group includes software company Oracle, Emirati investment firm MGX and California-based private equity firm Silver Lake, according to The New York Times. TikTok’s former head of operations, Adam Presser, will serve as chief executive officer of the U.S. entity.
The agreement was finalized just ahead of a federal deadline and brings to a close a years-long dispute over TikTok’s future in the United States. The deal was first publicly signaled last month.
Congress last year passed legislation requiring TikTok to divest or sell its U.S. operations, citing concerns that the app’s Chinese ownership posed a national security risk and could allow Beijing to influence its algorithm or access American user data.
In September, President Donald Trump signed an executive order approving a framework to keep TikTok available in the United States after the app briefly went offline amid uncertainty over compliance with the law.
Under the finalized agreement, ByteDance will retain a 19.9 percent ownership stake in the U.S. TikTok operation, the company said in a memo last month. The new ownership structure is intended to address U.S. government concerns by placing operational control and governance in the hands of American and allied investors.