As Washington, D.C., and Silicon Valley sit on the edge of their seats awaiting the fate of TikTok after the Supreme Court upheld a law banning it if wasn’t sold by Jan. 19, one Boston billionaire is eyeing an “incredibly serendipitous” opportunity to buy the app from owner ByteDance and reconfigure the inner workings of the internet.
Last week, after several months of public interest, Frank McCourt and a group of coinvestors, including Shark Tank host Kevin O’Leary, sent ByteDance a formal offer to buy TikTok. Leading the bid is McCourt’s internet advocacy group Project Liberty. McCourt said he currently values TikTok—without its famed algorithm—at $20 billion. As of December 2023, the entirety of ByteDance’s global operations was estimated to be worth somewhere around $268 billion.
