It is done ! SpaceX and Tesla boss Elon Musk has completed the purchase of social network Twitter. After months of a twist and turn saga, the new boss immediately fired boss Parag Agrawal and two other executives, chief financial officer Ned Segal and chief legal officer Vijaya Gadde, according to unnamed CNBC and Washington sources. Post. “The bird is free,” tweeted the whimsical billionaire, as confirmation of his takeover.
The operation dragged on since the announcement at the end of April of a $44 billion acquisition offer, reluctantly accepted by Twitter. The entrepreneur had sought to get out of it unilaterally in early July, accusing the company of having lied to him, but the company’s board of directors filed a complaint. A few days before the opening of a lawsuit that Twitter seemed on track to win, Elon Musk finally offered to close the transaction at the price initially agreed.
Elon Musk was pressed for time: a judge responsible for settling a dispute between the two parties gave them until Friday to agree, failing which a trial will take place in November.
Twitter will leave the stock market
The new owner of Twitter said Thursday that he wanted to allow all opinions to be expressed on the social network, but did not want to make it a “hellish” platform. It is “important for the future of civilization to have an online public square where a wide variety of opinions can debate in a healthy way, without resorting to violence”, he wrote in a message addressed to the advertisers.
Thursday evening, when the layoffs were announced in the media, several employees of the Californian group showed their support for the former management. “Thank you to Parag Agrawl, Vijaya Gadde and Ned Segal for their collective contribution to Twitter”, wrote Biz Stone, co-founder of the network, praising their “tremendous talent” and their “humanity”.
An employee, who spoke to AFP on condition of anonymity, calculated that more than 700 employees had left the California group since June, based on internal figures. “These are rather voluntary departures, either for ethical reasons or for basely financial reasons, because an unlisted company is less interesting,” he believes. The leader has, in fact, planned to take Twitter out of the stock market.