Trump claims Microsoft is negotiating to purchase TikTok.

On Monday (January 27, 2025), U.S. President Donald Trump informed reporters that Microsoft is discussing acquiring TikTok and expressed his desire to see a competitive bidding process for the app. Microsoft chose not to comment on the matter, while TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance, did not respond to Reuters' inquiries outside of regular business hours.

TikTok, which boasts around 170 million users in the United States, was temporarily taken offline just before a law mandating its Chinese owner, ByteDance, to either sell the app due to national security concerns or face a ban went into effect on January 19. Following his inauguration on January 20, Trump signed an executive order to postpone the law's enforcement by 75 days.

Last week, Trump mentioned that he was in discussions with several parties regarding the purchase of TikTok and anticipated deciding the app's future within 30 days. He has also indicated that he would support billionaire Elon Musk in acquiring the social media platform if Musk expressed interest, though Musk has not publicly responded to this suggestion.

In a recent development, AI startup Perplexity AI proposed a merger with TikTok, suggesting that the U.S. government could receive up to half of the new entity, according to a source who spoke to Reuters on Sunday.

This marks the second instance of Microsoft being considered as a potential buyer for TikTok. During Trump's first term, he mandated that TikTok separate its U.S. operations from ByteDance due to national security issues. Microsoft was a leading contender in 2020, but negotiations fell through, and Trump's push for divestment ended a few months later when he left office. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella described that deal as the "strangest thing I've ever worked on," noting that the U.