TikTok Deal Closes: New American Owners Take Control

ByteDance keeps 19.9%. Oracle, Silver Lake, and a UAE firm each get 15%. Trump allies now shape what 170 million Americans see.

TL;DR: TikTok's US joint venture officially formed on January 22, 2026, one day before the final deadline. ByteDance keeps 19.9%. Oracle, Silver Lake, and UAE-based MGX each hold 15%. Eight other investors split another 35%. The new entity will retrain TikTok's algorithm using only US user data. Adam Presser leads the operation. Oracle's Larry Ellison (a Trump ally) chairs the company that now stores all American TikTok data. Congressional hearings are coming.

The year-long saga is over. TikTok officially spun off its US operations into a new joint venture on January 22, 2026, the deadline set by President Trump's September executive order.[1]

170 million Americans keep their TikTok. But who controls what they see has fundamentally changed.

Who Owns TikTok Now

The new ownership structure splits the company three ways:[2]

  • 50%: New investor consortium (Oracle, Silver Lake, MGX with 15% each, plus five other investors)
  • 30.1%: Existing ByteDance investors (Susquehanna, KKR, General Atlantic)
  • 19.9%: ByteDance itself (just under the 20% cap required by law)

The three lead investors matter:

  • Oracle: Larry Ellison chairs the company. He's been golfing with Trump for years and has given millions to Republican campaigns. Oracle already stores TikTok's US data under a 2022 agreement.
  • Silver Lake: Private equity giant. Egon Durban now sits on TikTok's US board.
  • MGX: UAE investment firm focused on AI. Chaired by Tahnoun bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the UAE's national security adviser.[3]

So the app the US banned over concerns about foreign government influence is now partly owned by a UAE sovereign-adjacent fund led by a national security official. The irony writes itself.

What Changes

The new entity, "TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC," takes over several key functions:[4]

  • Algorithm retraining: The recommendation algorithm will be "retrained, tested, and updated" using only US user data
  • Content moderation: The US entity now has "decision-making authority for trust and safety policies"
  • Data storage: Oracle handles all American user data
  • Source code review: Oracle will "review and validate source code on an ongoing basis"

Adam Presser, formerly TikTok's head of operations and trust/safety, runs the new company. A seven-member board with American majority oversees him, including TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew.

What Doesn't Change

The user experience? Probably staying the same, at least for now.

"They don't want that algorithm to start pushing things they don't want to see," said Anupam Chander, a Georgetown professor, warning that users favor the current recommendation system.[4]

Timothy Edgar at Brown University put it this way: TikTok will "start with that success, but now will be able to make tweaks to it."[4]

Translation: The algorithm that got 170 million Americans hooked stays. But now different people can tweak it.

The Concerns Nobody's Addressing

Congress wanted Chinese influence out. They got American billionaires and a UAE sovereign fund in.

Rep. John Moolenaar (R-MI), chairman of the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, says hearings are coming. His two questions: "Does it make sure that the CCP does not have influence over the algorithm? And can we assure Americans that their data is secure?"[5]

Nobody's asking the third question: What happens when Trump allies control the algorithm for 170 million Americans during an election cycle?

Oracle's Ellison has Trump's ear. Silver Lake plays both sides of the aisle but tilts conservative. MGX answers to Abu Dhabi. These are the people who now decide what goes viral in America.

The 19.9% Problem

ByteDance kept 19.9%, just under the legal cap. The law required divestiture from "foreign adversary" control. ByteDance is still there.

The legal argument: 19.9% isn't control. The practical reality: ByteDance built the algorithm, trained the models, and maintains the infrastructure. Their engineers aren't all leaving.

Whether this satisfies the national security concerns that sparked the ban, or just reshuffles the deck chairs, depends on who you ask.

What This Means for Privacy

TikTok collected extensive data on 170 million Americans before the deal. It still collects that data now.

The change is who can access it. Before: theoretically, the Chinese government via ByteDance. Now: Oracle, American investors, and whatever data-sharing agreements they sign.

If you were concerned about surveillance capitalism before, this deal doesn't help. The data collection continues. The algorithm keeps learning what you want before you know you want it. The only thing that changed is the flag on the server.

What Happens Next

Congressional hearings are scheduled for "the coming months." Expect questions about:

  • How much ByteDance access remains
  • What Oracle's source code review actually covers
  • How the algorithm retraining affects content
  • Whether MGX's UAE ties create new national security concerns

For users, nothing changes today. Your For You page will keep serving content. Your data keeps flowing to Oracle's servers. The app keeps learning what makes you scroll.

The only difference: when Congress asks who controls what you see, the answer is now American billionaires instead of a Chinese tech company.

Progress, apparently.

References

  1. CNN - The deal to secure TikTok's future in the US has finally closed (January 22, 2026)
  2. Al Jazeera - Who controls TikTok's US platform under new deal (January 23, 2026)
  3. Bloomberg - TikTok's US Venture Deal: Ownership Structure, Valuation, Algorithm's Future (January 23, 2026)
  4. ABC News - What does the finalized TikTok deal mean for what users see on the app? (January 2026)
  5. Center for American Progress - Congress Must Demand the Full Details of the TikTok Deal (January 2026)