Elon Musk plans to cut 75% of Twitter workforce: report

Content of the article

Elon Musk plans to lay off most Twitter employees if he takes ownership of the social media company, according to a report published Thursday by The Washington Post.

Content of the article

Musk told potential investors during his Twitter buyout that he planned to cut nearly 75% of Twitter’s 7,500 employees, leaving the company with a small team, according to the report. The newspaper cited documents and unnamed sources familiar with the deliberations.

Content of the article

San Francisco-based Twitter and a representative for Musk’s attorney, Alex Spiro, did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment.

While job cuts were expected regardless of the sale, the scale of the job cuts planned by Musk is far more extreme than anything Twitter predicted. Musk himself has hinted at the need to eliminate some company personnel in the past, but he hadn’t given a specific number — at least not publicly.

Content of the article

“A 75% reduction in headcount would indicate, at least initially, stronger free cash flow and profitability, which would be attractive to investors looking to participate in the deal,” said Dan Ives, analyst at Wedbush. « That said, you can’t make your way to growth. »

RECOMMENDED VIDEO

Ives added that such a drastic downsizing of Twitter would likely set the company back years.

Already, experts, nonprofits and even Twitter staff have warned that withdrawing investments in content moderation and data security could harm Twitter and its users. With such a drastic reduction as Musk could foresee, the platform could quickly be overrun with harmful content and spam – the latter of which Musk himself has said he would take care of if he became the owner of the company. .

After his initial $44 billion bid in April to buy Twitter, Musk backed out of the deal, saying Twitter misrepresented the number of fake « spam bot » accounts on its platform. Twitter sued and a Delaware judge gave both sides until October 28 to work out the details. If not, there will be a trial in November.