‘Shark Tank’ star Kevin O’Leary wants to buy TikTok in a crowdfunded deal (2024)

“Shark Tank” star Kevin O’Leary wants to buy TikTok with the help of investors willing to pitch in for a stake in the Chinese-owned app.

O’Leary, the Canadian-born investor known as “Mr. Wonderful” for his skeptical persona on the hit reality television show, started a crowdfunding effort online to gauge public interest in helping him “in his quest to make TikTok an American-owned company.”

In response to a recent US law requiring China-based ByteDance to divest from its US holdings and sell TikTok’s American-based operations, O’Leary posted an item on the StartEngine crowdfunding site titled “Mr. Wonderful’s Plan to Buy TikTok.”

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O’Leary bills himself as a “renowned entrepreneur” who is “known for his sharp business acumen” as proven by his $3.8 billion sale of his software firm The Learning Company.

The investor is not soliciting funds just yet. Instead, he is inviting would-be investors to make a reservation — a “non-binding” move whereby “no money changes hands.”

At a later date, O’Leary will inform would-be investors when the offering launches so that they can then make a decision whether to commit funds to the process.

According to StartEngine, the offering is a “Regulation A+ Test the Waters” offering, which means it is open to the public.

In March, O’Leary told Fox News that he would either buy TikTok or join a syndicate that plans on buying it.

“Not going to get banned because I’m gonna buy it,” O’Leary said. “Somebody’s going to buy it. It won’t be Meta, and it won’t be Google because a regulator will stop that.”

O’Leary said that TikTok, with its more than 1 billion monthly active users worldwide and $16 billion in US revenue annually, is “worth billions.”

“It’s one of the most successful advertising platforms in social media today,” O’Leary said. “All my companies use it. I’ll buy it.”

O’Leary is the latest US-based businessman who has expressed interest in acquiring TikTok.

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Bobby Kotick, the former CEO of video game maker Activision Blizzard, has reportedly discussed buying TikTok.

Earlier this year, Steve Mnuchin, who was Treasury secretary under then-President Donald Trump, said he was assembling a group of investors to buy TikTok.

In 2020, Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison teamed up with Walmart in an attempt to buy a stake in TikTok’s US operations.

But that effort failed when TikTok successfully challenged a Trump administration order requiring it to sell its US operations to an American company.

The Post has sought comment from TikTok.

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Last month, Reuters reported that TikTok’s China-based parent company would prefer to shut down the app rather than sell it if all legal options are exhausted in its fight against the recently enacted law.

Sources close to ByteDance told Reuters that the algorithms that TikTok relies on for its operations are deemed core to the parent company’s overall operations — making the sale of the app highly unlikely.

TikTok accounts for a small share of ByteDance’s total revenues and daily active users, so the parent would rather have the app shut down in the US in a worst case scenario than sell it to a potential American buyer, they said.

A shutdown would have limited impact on ByteDance’s business while the company would not have to give up its core algorithm, said the sources, who declined to be named as they were not authorized to speak to the media.

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President Biden signed into law a measure that gives ByteDance until Jan. 19 to find a US-based buyer.

Biden could extend the deadline by three months if he sees that ByteDance has made progress in divesting of its US-based operations.

ByteDance does not publicly disclose its financial performance or the financial details of any of its units.

The company continues to make most of its money in China, mainly from its other apps such as Douyin, the Chinese equivalent of TikTok, separate sources have said.

ByteDance’s 2023 revenues rose to nearly $120 billion in 2023 from $80 billion in 2022, said two of the four sources.

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TikTok’s daily active users in the US also make up just about 5% of ByteDance’s daily active users worldwide, said one of the sources.

TikTok shares the same core algorithms with ByteDance domestic apps like short video platform Douyin, three of the sources said.

Its algorithms are considered better than ByteDance rivals such as Tencent and Xiaohongshu, said one of them.

It would be impossible to divest TikTok with its algorithms as their intellectual property license is registered under ByteDance in China and thus difficult to disentangle from the parent company, said the sources.

Moreover, separating the algorithms from TikTok’s US assets would be an extremely complicated procedure and ByteDance is unlikely to consider that option, the sources added.

With Post Wires

‘Shark Tank’ star Kevin O’Leary wants to buy TikTok in a crowdfunded deal (2024)

FAQs

Who is trying to buy TikTok? ›

Big Tech. Other tech giants including Microsoft, Oracle, and Meta have long been floated as possible candidates to buy out TikTok. They have the money, and some of them are already in the social-media game.

How much does it cost to buy TikTok? ›

At $100 billion, there are few companies that could afford to buy TikTok outright. And those that could in theory — Meta, Alphabet, Microsoft — would almost certainly run into regulatory roadblocks. “Who's going to buy it? That's the real question,” said Gene Kimmelman, a former Justice Department antitrust official.

What products have Kevin o leary invested in? ›

namedollars investedstake acquired
Groovebook$75,00040%
Shark Wheel$75,0002%
Velocity Signs$75,00010%
Bottle Breacher$75,0005%
36 more rows

What did Kevin from Shark Tank sell to Mattel? ›

In 1999, TLC was acquired by Mattel for US$4.2 billion. Following the acquisition, sales and earnings for Mattel soon dropped, and O'Leary was fired. The purchase by Mattel was later called one of the most disastrous corporate acquisitions in recent business history.

Does Kevin O'Leary want to buy TikTok? ›

O'Leary, a Canadian investor, first raised his hand to buy the platform in March, saying that TikTok is "not going to get banned because I'm gonna buy it." He said that he didn't think Google or Meta would be able to purchase it because of antitrust concerns.

What companies are trying to buy TikTok? ›

  • Former Activision CEO Bobby Kotick. Former Activision CEO Bobby Kotick has reportedly expressed interest in buying TikTok. ...
  • Former Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin. Former Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin wants in on TikTok. ...
  • Entrepreneur and investor Kevin O'Leary. ...
  • Oracle cofounder Larry Ellison and Walmart. ...
  • Microsoft.
Apr 22, 2024

Who owns TikTok right now? ›

TikTok, whose mainland Chinese counterpart is Douyin, is a short-form video hosting service owned by Chinese internet company ByteDance. It hosts user-submitted videos, which can range in duration from three seconds to 60 minutes. It can be accessed with a smartphone app. TikTok Pte. Ltd.

How much does TikTok pay per 1000 views? ›

According to reports from top influencers, TikTok pays around $0.02 and $0.04 for every 1,000 views. These are reports based on payments received through the TikTok Creator Fund. This is a program that TikTok introduced in 2021 in a bid to compensate content creators for creating content on the platform.

How much is the owner of TikTok worth? ›

Zhang's 21% slice of ByteDance is worth more than $40 billion, based on the company's $268 billion valuation during a recent share buyback program. The filing also shows Zhang has held onto his shares over the past year, since TikTok's CEO revealed his boss's stake of around 20% during a Congressional hearing.

What is Mark Cuban's most successful Shark Tank investment? ›

Let's dive deeper into some of his most successful investments from Shark Tank.
  • Tower Paddle Boards. One of Cuban's notable investments is Tower Paddle Boards — a unique company that specializes in inflatable paddle boards and beach lifestyle products. ...
  • Nut's 'N More. ...
  • Prep Expert. ...
  • Ten Thirty-One Productions.
May 18, 2024

What was Kevin Oleary's best deal on Shark Tank? ›

O'Leary's most successful "Shark Tank" investment was in a pet-DNA-testing company called BasePaws that was eventually sold to pet pharma giant Zoetis. When asked about the acquisition on a podcast, O'Leary implied that the deal was worth significantly more than the “over $50 million” announced by the show.

How much does Kevin o leary make per episode of Shark Tank? ›

While the exact amount that O'Leary makes per episode of Shark Tank is not publicly known, it has been reported that he earns a significant amount of money from his appearances on the show. According to a report from Celebrity Net Worth, O'Leary earns a salary of $350,000 per episode of Shark Tank.

Is Kevin from Shark Tank a billionaire? ›

Kevin is the second richest shark with an estimated net worth of $400 million, per Celebrity Net Worth.

What was the most profitable item on Shark Tank? ›

What are the most successful 'Shark Tank' products?
  1. Bombas. Bombas, a sock company that now also makes bras and t-shirts, came to the minds of co-founders David Heath and Randy Goldberg when they learned that the number-one most-requested clothing item in homeless shelters was socks. ...
  2. Scrub Daddy. ...
  3. Squatty Potty.
Jan 16, 2024

Why is TikTok being forced to sell? ›

The stated concerns are threefold: the Chinese government could obtain data about American citizens, the app could be used to spread propaganda to American citizens through algorithmic amplification, and related national security concerns around surveillance and disruptive communications.

What company purchased TikTok? ›

Who owns TikTok now? TikTok, with more than 170 million American users, is a subsidiary of Chinese technology firm ByteDance, which is why U.S. lawmakers describe the company as "Chinese-owned."

Why does Walmart want to buy TikTok? ›

Walmart has already acknowledged the value of e-commerce when it comes to TikTok. The company said Thursday that its interest in the app stems from the way it has “integrated e-commerce and advertising capabilities in other markets,” and added that TikTok could bolster Walmart's access to consumers.

Why is TikTok getting banned in the US? ›

Concerns that the Chinese government could access sensitive user data through the short-form video app TikTok, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, have prompted the U.S. government to pass legislation banning the social media platform unless it is sold to a government-approved buyer.

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