[BENGALURU] As the weekend deadline for TikTok to find a buyer approaches, bidders for the short-video social media site are piling up.
Amazon and, separately, a consortium led by OnlyFans founder Tim Stokely are the latest to throw their hats into the ring for TikTok. The site faces an Apr 5 deadline to reach a deal to find a non-Chinese buyer under threat of being banned from the United States.
US officials have raised security concerns over the app’s ties to China, which TikTok and owner ByteDance have denied. Trump administration officials are meeting on Wednesday (Apr 2) to discuss the various options for TikTok.
Startup Zoop, which is run by Stokely, founder of adult content social media site OnlyFans, has partnered with a cryptocurrency foundation to submit a late-stage plan to bid for TikTok, the two told Reuters on Wednesday.
A US administration official confirmed Amazon had sent a letter to Vice-President JD Vance and Department of Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick. Amazon declined to comment, while TikTok and ByteDance did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Shares of Amazon rose about 2 per cent following news of the last-minute TikTok bid.
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Amazon has long harboured ambitions for an in-house social media network that could help it sell more goods and appeal to a younger audience. It bought live video site Twitch in 2014 for nearly US$1 billion and book review site Goodreads in 2013 as part of its efforts to build a viable social network.
Amazon also developed and tested a TikTok-like short-form video and photo feed called Inspire that it shuttered earlier this year.
Trump said last month his administration was in touch with four different groups about the sale of the platform, without identifying them.
Private equity firm Blackstone is discussing joining ByteDance’s non-Chinese shareholders, led by Susquehanna International Group and General Atlantic, in contributing fresh capital to bid for TikTok’s US business, Reuters reported last week.
US venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz is also in talks to add outside funding to buy out TikTok’s Chinese investors, as part of a bid led by Oracle and other American investors to carve it out of ByteDance, the Financial Times reported on Tuesday.
White House-led talks entail plans to spin off a US entity for TikTok and dilute Chinese ownership in the new business to below a 20 per cent threshold required by US law, Reuters reported last month.
The New York Times first reported Amazon’s involvement on Wednesday. Various parties who have been involved in the talks do not appear to be taking Amazon’s bid seriously, The New York Times reported.
The future of the app used by nearly half of all Americans has been up in the air since a 2024 law, passed with overwhelming bipartisan support, required ByteDance to divest TikTok by Jan 19.
Washington officials have said TikTok’s ownership by ByteDance makes it beholden to the Chinese government, and Beijing could use the app to conduct influence operations against the United States and collect data on Americans. REUTERS
