Former Activision CEO Bobby Kotick is reportedly considering buying social network TikTok, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Kotick had floated the idea of partnering on the purchase to a group of potential partners this week, including OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, and said that he had also spoken with ByteDance Executive Chair Zhang Yiming.
Kotick stepped down from Activision in late December after more than three decades, following the approval of the Microsoft takeover, and had experienced a turbulent period during his tenure that included a 2021 lawsuit which was settled last year.
Apart from the the fact that lawmakers concerns about TikTok are centred on fears of data privacy and its connection to China, The Wall Street Journal points out that involving Altman in the purchase may open the social network to the possibility of being used by OpenAI to train its AI models.
This is a precarious time for TikTok, as the Biden Administration is supporting a bipartisan bill, which will be introduced into the US House of Representatives this week, to force TikTok’s China-based parent company ByteDance, to sell the app.
Under the bill, ByteDance will have to sell the app within six months, otherwise it will be banned from US app stores
Closer to home, a report in the Australian Financial Review by Technology Writer Nick Bonyhad states that if the US forces TikTok to be sold, “it will resolve a headache for the government here” but if banned, would cause problems.
“Should the government enforce the ban and infuriate China, risking the reintroduction of trade strikes, or allow TikTok to keep operating, defying the US and the national security establishment while handing a political weapon to the Coalition?”
Bonyhad suggests that the outcome will be risky either way.
