Bloomberg News reported on the bid earlier on Friday.Sarnevesht said this was because TikTok was not involved in the talks, adding that Triller and Centricus were dealing directly with ByteDance chairman Zhang Yiming."The company has not had any conversations with them and we are unaware of any interest," ByteDance said in a statement.
The proposed US$20 billion bid will be financed by Centricus, with Triller executives running TikTok should their bid prevail, according to a person familiar with the financial details, who sought anonymity. It was not immediately clear, however, if Centricus, with US$27 billion in assets according to its website, could muster the resources for such a bid."We understand our offer is upsetting to some TikTok US executives, as it upsets a deal that may be more favorable to them and less favorable to the shareholders," Mr Sarnevesht said in his statement.Triller boasts 65 million monthly active users, versus TikTok's 100 million in the United States. Triller sought a US$1.
While TikTok is best known for its anodyne videos of people dancing and having going viral among teenagers, US officials have expressed concern that user information could be passed to China's communist government."We've gotten assurances from people close to the White House that this is something that the administration would favor," Mr Sarnevesht said.
"All we need TikTok to do is to give us their user data and the content, and the Triller platform can handle it."BT is now on Telegram!