MrBeast, Roblox CEO Eye $20B TikTok Acquisition

Jimmy Donaldson, widely recognized as the YouTuber MrBeast, is part of a formidable group of investors aiming to purchase TikTok. This consortium, which includes Jesse Tinsley of Employer.com, Roblox co-founder and CEO David Baszucki, and Nathan McCauley from the crypto platform Anchorage Digital, has reportedly set their sights on acquiring the social media giant for over $20 billion. They estimate that a successful bid would require around $25 billion.

Despite these ambitious plans, TikTok's parent company, ByteDance, has made it clear that its U.S. operations are not on the market. The group led by Tinsley has yet to receive any direct feedback from ByteDance. Meanwhile, representatives for Donaldson have indicated that he is engaging with multiple parties and is open to aligning with the most promising contender in this high-stakes acquisition race. On January 22, Donaldson expressed his enthusiasm on Twitter, stating, "The leading groups who are all credible bidding on TikTok have reached out for us to help them, I’m excited to partner/make this a reality. Big things cooking."

Earlier in the week, former U.S. President Donald Trump announced that Microsoft was in discussions to acquire TikTok and expressed his desire for a competitive bidding war. However, Microsoft has not yet confirmed these claims.

TikTok experienced a brief outage affecting its 170 million U.S. users just before a law was set to take effect on January 19, which mandated ByteDance to sell TikTok due to national security concerns or face a ban. This outage occurred after the Supreme Court rejected TikTok's appeal in its First Amendment challenge. The justices noted the widespread practice of data collection in the digital era but highlighted TikTok's unique risks due to its scale and potential for foreign control, justifying special treatment to address national security issues.

Following assurances from Trump, TikTok was able to restore its service without facing immediate penalties. TikTok hailed this development as a victory for the First Amendment and against arbitrary censorship, expressing a willingness to collaborate with Trump on a long-term solution to keep TikTok operational in the U.S.

Upon taking office on January 20, Trump issued an executive order to delay the enforcement of the law for 75 days. He has been actively discussing potential buyout scenarios with various companies and individuals, including the possibility of Elon Musk, owner of X/Twitter, taking over TikTok.