Tiktok was the strangest thing I have ever worked on: Nadella
Back in August 2020 Microsoft Corp had been in talks for the acquisition of video sharing company, but things didn’t go as planned
image for illustrative purpose
Hyderabad Satya Nadella, Executive Chairman and CEO of Microsoft Corp, speaking at Code Conference in Beverly Hills, California quoted that the company's near acquisition of Tiktok, a video-sharing social networking app was the 'strangest thing he has ever worked on'.
Nadella said: "It was the strangest thing I've ever worked on." "It's unbelievable," Nadella said of the experience during the on-stage interview. "I learned so many things about so much and so many people. First of all, TikTok came to us. We didn't go to TikTok," he added.
Back in August 2020 Microsoft Corp had been in talks for the acquisition of Tiktok, but things didn't go as planned. Soon the video sharing company was ordered by thenUS President Donald Trump to separate its US version from Chinese parent ByteDance because of national security concerns about the collection of US users' data. Microsoft began talks on the proposed acquisition, but the deal collapsed by September.
Trump's divestment push ended by the time he left office in January and no potential suitor ending up acquiring TikTok. Nadella said he was looking forward to bringing Microsoft's security, child safety and cloud expertise to TikTok. "TikTok was caught in between a lot of things happening across two capitals," Nadella continued. "President Trump had a particular point of view of what he was trying to get done there, and then it just dropped off. The Government had a particular set ofrequirements and then it just disappeared."
Nadella said what attracted ByteDance CEO Zhang Yiming to Microsoft was the US company's services related to content moderation and child safety, developed through products included in Xbox video gaming tools and on business social network LinkedIn.
ByteDance did not immediately respond to a request for comment.Nadella said he has no idea whether the US is still pushing for a deal under President Joe Biden. The Biden administration has said earlier that it is reviewing the national security concerns. "At this point, I'm happy with what I have," Nadella backed out saying that.
