American billionaire Elon Musk has dismissed any interest in acquiring TikTok, the short-video app at risk of a US ban due to national security concerns over its Chinese parent company, ByteDance.
Musk revealed that he had not placed a bid for TikTok, weeks after US President Donald Trump indicated he was open to the idea of Musk acquiring the ByteDance-owned app.
He shared these comments—his first on the topic of buying TikTok—last month at a conference in Germany hosted by Mathias Doepfner, the billionaire CEO of German media giant Axel Springer.
Speaking remotely via video at the conference, which was made public on Saturday, Musk said, “I have not put in a bid for TikTok.”
“I don’t have any plans for what would I do if I had TikTok.”
Musk mentioned that he does not use TikTok personally.
“I’m not chomping at the bit to acquire TikTok,” said Musk, who bought Twitter in 2022 before renaming the social media service X.
“I usually build companies from scratch.”
President Trump had signed an executive order postponing the ban on the popular short-video app, which was initially set to take effect on January 19.
ByteDance had until January to sell TikTok’s US assets or risk a ban, as lawmakers feared the app could threaten national security by giving China access to US user data.
Trump mentioned that he was in talks with several parties regarding TikTok’s possible purchase and anticipated making a decision on its future this month.
