Reading lesson: “Microsoft May Buy TikTok”

The on-off talks between Microsoft and the Chinese owner of the app TikTok are ready to begin again. Microsoft has been interested in buying part of TikTok for a long time and the tech giant has been in talks with the parent company ByteDance Ltd to discuss the possibility of a deal.

Discussions came to a halt recently when US President Donald Trump suggested that he might ban TikTok from the USA. He was concerned that the personal data and details of American TikTok users could be used by the Chinese or sold to other companies. President Trump changed his mind over the weekend after a conversation with the CEO of Microsoft. Microsoft said it “would ensure that all private data of TikTok’s American users is transferred to and remains in the United States.”

TikTok is one of the newer social media platforms to become incredibly popular around the world. Users can upload very short videos of themselves lip-syncing to songs, dancing, teaching users different skills or recipes, and much more.

TikTok’s owner ByteDance is a Beijing-based Internet company founded in 2012 by Chinese entrepreneur Zhang Yiming. As of the summer of 2020, it had over 800 million users worldwide. Microsoft is offering ByteDance $50 billion to take over operations in the US, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. However, the business website Bloomberg disagrees with that valuation. It said: “The idea that TikTok – without the UK, India or dozens of other emerging markets – is worth $50 billion today is fanciful.”

Whether or not this deal will come to any agreement is yet to be seen.