Evan Spiegel, the chief executive of Snap, has said that any US company will find TikTok “really challenging” to digest, playing down the idea that Snap had any interest in bidding for the viral video app’s US operations.

“For whoever purchases TikTok, it basically requires you to build the entire core technology from the ground up to support the service and to do so without any engineering talent?.?.?.?and without the core technology,” said Mr Spiegel, at the FT Weekend Festival.  

He added that Snap typically preferred to acquire companies together with their engineers, a move that may not be possible with TikTok. “Typically if you buy a business, it comes with a really talented team and I think for us the team is usually everything,” said Mr Spiegel.