ByteDance forms joint venture: Who owns TikTok in the US now?

TikTok’s Chinese parent company, ByteDance, just spun out an American venture to operate the popular video app in the United States.

The deal, announced on Jan 23, is part of an effort to comply with a 2024 federal law that aimed to separate TikTok from ByteDance to address national security concerns over the app’s ties to Beijing.

Under the arrangement, non-Chinese investors will own about 80 per cent of the American venture. ByteDance will keep 19.9 per cent of it. The new venture will license the app’s powerful recommendation algorithm from ByteDance and have the power to moderate content on the app.

So who are the owners of US TikTok?

Oracle

Oracle is a cloud computing and database software company that was founded in the 1970s. It works closely with major companies, including OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT, on data centres that can run and deliver its technology to consumers.

What is its stake? Oracle has a 15 per cent stake in the new American entity, tied for the biggest percentage among the new investors.

Who is in charge? Mr Larry Ellison, one of the richest men in the world, helped found Oracle and is now its executive chair and chief technology officer.

The Ellison family has been in the news a lot. Mr Ellison’s son, Mr David, in 2025 bought the Paramount movie studio and the companies under its umbrella.

Both Ellisons have connections to US President Donald Trump. Mr Larry Ellison has frequently visited the White House and Mar-a-Lago. Mr David Ellison recently sat with the President at an Ultimate Fighting Championship match and later spent US$7.7 billion (S$9.8 billion) to buy the league’s broadcast rights.

What is notable? Oracle has been enmeshed with TikTok for years. In 2022, Oracle started housing Americans’ TikTok data on its servers, an effort by TikTok to convince the US government that it would not expose any information to Beijing.

Under the new TikTok agreement, Oracle will oversee the security of Americans’ data and monitor changes and updates to TikTok’s powerful recommendation technology. Mr Kenneth Glueck, an executive vice-president at Oracle, will have a seat on the new venture’s board. The company declined to comment on its investment.

MGX

MGX, an Emirati investment company that started in 2024, focuses on technology and AI investments and is a major investor in semiconductor manufacturing and data centres. It has partnerships with Microsoft and BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager. It has also invested in billionaire Elon Musk’s AI company, xAI, and OpenAI.

What is its stake? MGX, like Oracle, has a 15 per cent stake in the American TikTok app.

Who is in charge? MGX was founded by Mubadala, Abu Dhabi’s sovereign wealth fund, and G42, an Emirati AI company. The firm’s chief strategy and safety officer, Mr David Scott, will have a seat on the new venture’s board.

G42 has a number of ties to China. Under the Biden administration, the Central Intelligence Agency and other American spy agencies issued warnings about G42’s work with large Chinese companies that US officials consider security threats.

The company, it said, has offloaded its investments in some large Chinese companies, including ByteDance, as part of an agreement to work with Microsoft and after some members of Congress raised concerns.

What is notable: MGX has been involved in at least two deals involving Mr Trump. In 2025, a so-called stablecoin developed by the Trump family’s cryptocurrency firm, World Liberty Financial, was used to complete a transaction between MGX and Binance, the largest crypto exchange in the world.

MGX also helped finance a US$100 billion initiative announced by Mr Trump in January 2025 that is focused on building AI data centres. Oracle also participated.

Silver Lake

Silver Lake is an investment company based in Menlo Park, California. It focuses on tech investments and has worked with tech giants including Dell and Waymo, the robotaxi service owned by Alphabet, Google’s parent company.

What is its stake? It also has a 15 per cent stake.

Who is in charge? Mr Egon Durban and Mr Greg Mondre are the company’s co-CEOs. Mr Durban is on the board of Dell, G42 and Waymo. Mr Durban will have a seat on the new entity’s board.

What is notable? Silver Lake previously teamed up with MGX, including on the acquisition in 2025 of a majority stake in Altera, a software and chip company. And it has been an investor in G42 since 2021.

Silver Lake has ties to Oracle, too. One of its partners, Vantage Data Centers, invested US$15 billion in a data centre campus in Wisconsin as part of a collaboration between Oracle and OpenAI.

ByteDance

The Chinese tech company was founded in 2012, and it invests heavily in AI. It owns several apps and launched TikTok in 2017, spinning it out of China’s domestic version of the app, Douyin, which has about 700 million users.

ByteDance also owns Toutiao, a news app. The company has been valued at US$480 billion in the private markets.

What is its stake? The company will have a 19.9 per cent stake in the American TikTok app.

Who is in charge? The CEO is Mr Liang Rubo, a co-founder who took the top role after another co-founder, Mr Zhang Yiming, stepped down in 2021. Mr Zhang, one of the world’s richest men, still works at the company, focusing on strategy.

What is notable? The 19.9 per cent stake is the maximum allowed under the 2024 federal law. ByteDance still owns the global TikTok brand.

Everyone Else

The other investors include the personal investment entity for Mr Michael Dell, the tech billionaire behind Dell Technologies, and a long list of investment firms, including affiliates of General Atlantic and Susquehanna, both of which previously invested in ByteDance.

TikTok also pointed to Alpha Wave Partners, Revolution, Virgo LI, NJJ Capital and Merritt Way, which is affiliated with a San Francisco-based firm called Dragoneer. NYTIMES