The real reasons for Microsoft’s failed takeover attempt

In 2020 and for almost a year, the TikTok app had a sword of Damocles over its head. The application was notably accused of spying for the benefit of the Chinese government by the Trump administration. Former President Donald Trump issued an executive order in August 2020 to ban the application from his territory. The only alternative presented at the time was the forced takeover of the American branch of the company by an American company. For a long time, Microsoft was considered as a potential buyer.

Finally, after the rejection of Microsoft’s offer by ByteDance, the company announced that it would no longer buy TikTok. Oracle at that time presented itself with a new offer, but ultimately, after several months of hesitation where the US administration seemed to have forgotten the ban on the application, President Joe Biden decided to revoke the ban in June. 2021.

“The strangest file”

This very strange part of the history of TikTok having now ended, Satya Nadella, the CEO of Microsoft, returned to the Code Conference on “the strangest file” on which he could have worked.

At the time, the social network was of interest to Microsoft because it was a cloud-based and AI-based product, two areas of interest to the company. For once, however, it was not Microsoft who made the takeover process: “TikTok came to us, we did not come to TikTok,” says Satya Nadella. “The company was looking for an American partner to help it with ‘the security issues that everyone seemed to have heard about.’

Satya Nadella added that Microsoft would have been an interesting partner for TikTok with “investments in social media, especially those that [Microsoft] made in terms of content moderation and child safety ”.

In the end, the buyout did not go much further than a few negotiations: “There was a period when I thought that the [gouvernement américain] had a particular set of requirements, [mais] it just disappeared, ”says Nadella. “I think President Trump had a particular take on what he was trying to do… then he just gave up. “

As to whether Microsoft would like to buy TikTok if the offer arose today, Satya Nadella replied that Microsoft is no longer interested.