Elon Musk fired several Twitter Inc. executives after completing his takeover of the company, according to The Wall Street Journal citing people familiar with the matter, capping an unusual corporate battle and setting up one of the world’s most influential social-media platforms for potentially broad change.
Musk fired Chief Executive Parag Agrawal and Chief Financial Officer Ned Segal after the deal closed, the people said. Musk also fired Vijaya Gadde, Twitter’s top legal and policy executive, and Sean Edgett, general counsel. Spokespeople for Twitter didn’t comment.
Hours after those actions, Mr. Musk tweeted: “the bird is freed” in a seeming reference to Twitter, which has a blue bird as its logo.
Entering Twitter HQ – let that sink in! pic.twitter.com/D68z4K2wq7
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 26, 2022
Musk first agreed to buy Twitter in April for $44 billion, then threatened to walk away from the deal, before reversing course again this month and committing to see through the acquisition. He previously indicated unhappiness with some of the top ranks at Twitter, at one point responding to a tweet from Mr. Agrawal with a poop emoji. He also used the site to mock Gadde, the top legal boss, tweeting an image overlaid with text that repeated allegations Twitter had a left-wing political bias.
It wasn’t immediately clear who would step into the top positions left vacant by Thursday’s exits.
The deal, in which Twitter will again become a private company, adds to Musk’s expansive business reach, which also includes running Tesla Inc., the world’s most-valuable car company, and rocket company Space Exploration Technologies Corp., or SpaceX, among other endeavors. Mr. Musk, who had become Twitter’s largest individual shareholder, previously said he would pay for the acquisition mostly with cash, some contributed by co-investors, and $13 billion in debt.
In a message to advertisers on Twitter on Thursday, Mr. Musk said he was buying the company to “have a common digital town square, where a wide range of beliefs can be debated in a healthy manner.” He said Twitter “cannot become a free-for-all hellscape, where anything can be said with no consequences!”
Dear Twitter Advertisers pic.twitter.com/GMwHmInPAS
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 27, 2022
Musk said the platform must be “warm and welcoming to all” and suggested Twitter could let people “choose your desired experience according to your preferences, just as you can choose, for example, to see movies or play videogames ranging from all ages to mature.”
No comments:
Post a Comment