Elon Musk took control of Twitter on Thursday night and immediately fired the company’s CEO, CFO, and legal head, news agencies reported Friday, citing internal sources.
The sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, did not confirm that legal administration of the deal, originally valued at $44 billion, had been completed, but acknowledged that Musk had taken control of the company and fired CEO Parag Agrawal, chief financial officer Ned Segal and chief legal officer Vijaya Gadde.
A few hours later, Musk tweeted that “the bird is free,” referring to the bluebird in the company’s logo.
The layoffs came hours before a Friday deadline set by a Delaware judge to complete the deal, who threatened to file a lawsuit against the parties if they did not.
Although the layoffs were carried out at lightning speed, the personnel changes were not surprising; the Tesla CEO is expected to make many more similar moves at Twitter.
Musk clashed with Agrawal back in April, just before he decided to make an offer to buy the company, according to text messages in court documents.
At that time, Musk also criticized Gadde on Twitter, after which the legal director, who has worked at the company for 11 years, received racist and misogynistic messages from countless other Twitter users on the microblog, and many demanded that Musk fire the lawyer.
Musk’s goal with the changes is to increase the number of Twitter users and the company’s revenue.
In his first major move, Musk sought to reassure worried Twitter advertisers by saying that he bought the social medium to help humanity and that he didn’t want Twitter to become “everyone’s shame room.”
Dear Twitter Advertisers pic.twitter.com/GMwHmInPAS
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 27, 2022
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