And it has already started firing several executives.
After months of legal conflicts, Elon Musk finally closed the acquisition of Twitter, for US$ 44 billion, on Thursday, the 27th.
The businessman offered to buy the social network in April, then changed his mind and tried to back out in May. He changed his mind again, and on October 4, he filed a letter with the Securities and Exchange Commission affirming his commitment to the original deal. He then had the deadline until today, October 28, to close the deal.
Not unexpectedly, Musk has already fired Parag Agrawal, who succeeded Jack Dorsey as Twitter’s CEO, given his previous criticism of Twitter’s executive team. Chief financial officer Ned Segal. Vijaya Gadde, the company’s chief policy officer. Sean Edgett, the general counsel and director of the customer service, and Sarah Personette – some of whom even reported being escorted out of the company building by security.
Doubts remain about what Musk plans to do with Twitter now that he has it. Mainly because he only provided vague details of his various plans, which include increasing subscriptions (including being able to charge Governments and corporations a “small cost” to use Twitter), providing alternative algorithms for a more personalized experience, and improving targeting. And matching application data to advertisements and other content.
Musk has also talked about using Twitter to create “X, the everything app,” referring to WeChat. This Chinese app spans multiple businesses: “You live on WeChat in China,” Musk told Twitter employees in June. . “If we can recreate that with Twitter, we’re going to be a big hit.”
In addition, there have been several comments about the possible dismissal of many employees, and one of the main themes: the CEO also suggested that he will change the way Twitter moderation works, potentially relaxing the policies that made former President Donald Trump permanently banned from the platform. On Thursday night, hours after news broke of the finalized deal (and the firing of the first executives), he tweeted the following:
the bird is freed
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 28, 2022
But before closing the deal, he tried to allay employee fears that big layoffs were coming and assured advertisers that their earlier criticism of Twitter’s content moderation rules wouldn’t detract from its appeal: “Twitter obviously cannot become a hell free for all, where anything can be said without consequences!” Musk said in an open letter to advertisers on Thursday.
Elon Musk Twitter is expected to share more about his plan for Twitter with employees later today. All this, of course, means that much on this subject is yet to come.